Founder of Amazon.com Jeff Bezos has announced that his mysterious space technology company called Blue Origin, will now secure a launch pad at Cape Canaveral Air Force base in Florida that will manufacture and launch rocket missions into space, sometime later this decade.
Bezos revealed that their new home at the Space Coast will be anchored at the launch site known as Complex 36 which has been the site for numerous historical launches including NASA's Pioneer, Mariner and Surveyor space probes. However, the site's last launch was in 2005 that has been silent for more than 10 years, as Bezos is now preparing to fix this launch pad.
Other nearby launch pads that are active right now on Cape Canaveral belong to Elon Musk's SpaceX and United Launch Alliance which has been a joint venture of the Lockheed Martin Corp. and Boeing.
Bezos also cited more details regarding his foray into space race, adding that the company's Florida operations will not just involve launches but also building and development. He says that their American made BE-4 engine that will be the power used for their upcoming orbital launch vehicle will be tested at Cape Canaveral also.
This new space facility will also create 330 jobs and will produce an investment of US $200 million locally according to state officials.
Blue Origin's flagship rocket is known as the New Shepard which is a suborbital launch system that is designed to ferry people into lower Earth orbit via a reusable booster system similar to SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket. However, Blue Origin's rocket already performed initial tests in Texas last April where its propulsion module's function failed.
In April, Bezos said that if the New Shepard was originally designed to become an expendable booster rocket, its first test flight would have been flawless. However, the company aims to reuse rockets and unfortunately, the propulsion module was lost due to its hydraulic system during descent.
To date, Bezos still has not yet disclosed any details of the exact timeline about when the company's rockets will be ready for launch.