Blue Origin Beats SpaceX After NASA Chooses Jeff Bezos’ Company for Psyche Mission

Jeff Bezos' company, Blue Origin, beat Elon Musk's SpaceX after NASA gave the former a multi-million contract to join its Psyche mission. Thus, Bezos' spacecraft is heading to Mars ahead of Musk.

NASA Awards Blue Origin $20M Contract

NASA announced Wednesday that it awarded Blue Origin a $20 million deal to launch two scientific spacecraft to the Red Planet on the first Blue Origin New Glenn rocket in August 2024. The NASA cargo was initially scheduled to be found on a Falcon Heavy rocket by Musk's SpaceX business in October of this year, along with NASA's Psyche mission, which was headed for an asteroid.

However, the space agency withdrew the other craft from the launch since the Falcon Heavy could not place them on the correct trajectory to enter Mars' orbit.

The revelation of the new schedule coincides with the explosion of Musk's Starship rocket during a second launch attempt. The SpaceX and Tesla CEOs plan to use the Starship rocket to transport people to the moon and eventually Mars.

NASA's Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorer (ESCAPADE) project will send two identical spacecraft carrying three experiments to examine how solar winds affect the planet's magnetosphere-riding along with the unproven Blue Origin New Glenn rocket.

This mission is a component of a larger NASA initiative to engage commercial contractors for less expensive Mars transportation.

This is the newest development in the space race between the two billionaires - Musk and Bezos - which began earlier this year when NASA awarded each company separate multibillion-dollar contracts to send astronauts to the moon. Musk called Bezos a "dilettante" when it came to space travel, yet the creator of Blue Origin is on track to arrive at Mars ahead of SpaceX.

Blue Origin on Amazon's Project Kuiper

Blue Origin is also part of the ambitious Project Kuiper alongside United Launch Alliance (ULA) and Arianespace. The three companies received a multi-million contract to launch Amazon's Project Kuiper constellation in April 2022. Despite delays, they insisted that they would release the satellites on time.

None of the three vehicles had launched after the contract was signed, and all three had suffered serious development failures and had not even attempted a single launch.

During a panel discussion on Sept. 11 at Euroconsult's World Satellite Business Week, executives from the three launch companies said they are getting closer to the first launches of their vehicles.

Barrett Jones, senior vice president for New Glenn at Blue Origin, stated that the rocket's initial launch is still scheduled for 2024. He did not, however, give a more precise date. Instead, he said that integrated hot-fire testing would come first, and the first flight vehicle would arrive at the integration center by the end of the year.

In 2024, Blue Origin plans to launch New Glenn several times. According to Jones, they plan to fulfill their contractual obligations, which include NASA's ESCAPADE Mars smallsat mission, by the end of the following year.

ULA's president and chief executive, Tory Bruno, said they planned to ship the Vulcan Centaur out to the pad in November and launch the vehicle in December. Stéphane Israël, chief executive of Arianespace, also said that "things are progressing very well" on their end, noting that Ariane 6 will make its debut flight in 2024.

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