Jeff Bezos space company Blue Origin was awarded a NASA Launch Services (NLS) II contract with NASA on Wednesday, it announced the U.S. space agency.
This means the aerospace company will be able to compete for future NASA space missions, along with SpaceX, for example.
Under the NLS II contract, Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket will be able to participate in planetary missions, Earth observation, as well as satellite launches, as the company pointed out on its website.
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New Glenn is an impressive rocket. It is powerful 310-feet (94.5 meters) reusable reusable elevation 45 tons of payload into the low-orbit Earth, and is expected to launch in 2021.
That means New Glenn will be able to launch about a third more into space than SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket.
As Blue Origin explained, “New Glenn is a single-stage reusable heavy-duty launch vehicle with seven BE-4 natural gas rocket engines. The vehicle’s seven-meter run offers more than twice the usability of any launch vehicle. “
We are expanding our partnership with @NASA today with addition #NewGlenn to the Launch Services Program catalog. Read the details https://t.co/PaFwnTC0tO pic.twitter.com/R2TJPokxOG
– Blue Origins (@blueorigin) 16 December 2020
Under the new NASA contract, NASA centers in the US will be able to “spacecraft design to take advantage of New Glenn’s exceptional seven-meter performance and heavy-duty construction for a wide range of missions. “It will also allow Blue Origin to compete for missions through the Launch Service Action Orders set up by NASA up to 2027.
“We are proud to be in NASA’s catalog of launch services and look forward to providing reliable blades for NASA’s future missions aboard New Glenn for years to come,” said Jarrett Jones , Blue Glen’s senior vice president at Blue Origin.
“The award builds on Blue Origin’s partnership with NASA and promotes science and research to benefit the Earth.”