Jeff Bezos, the second richest man in the world, successfully blasted off a 320-foot-tall rocket ship made by his Blue Origin company from Cape Canaveral, Florida, in the early hours of the morning. It made the company the first to successfully reach orbit on its first launch of an orbital-class rocket.
Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, two tech moguls who have spent years battling it out for supremacy in the space race, seem to have buried the hatchet—at least, publicly. Their friendly exchange on social media following the results of their respective rocket launches marks a possible end to their long-standing rivalry.
A Pulitzer-winning editorial cartoonist revealed that she quit her job at The Washington Post after management axed her drawing of billionaires—including Jeff Bezos, the paper’s owner—bending the knee to Donald Trump.
Bezos’ space company Blue Origin started at about the same time as Musk’s SpaceX but since then Musk’s firm has launched more than 400 of its Falcon 9 rockets into orbit and is testing out its giant Starship rocket which it hopes will send astronauts to the Moon and one day possibly on to Mars.
Elon Musk reposted a photo taken of him and Jeff Bezos at dinner together over twenty years ago. "Wow, a lot has happened in 21 years!" he wrote while reacting to the picture.
The company said it was "reviewing opportunities for our next launch attempt."
The mission, the culmination of a decade-long, multi-billion-dollar development journey, will include an attempt to land New Glenn’s first stage booster on a sea-fairing barge in the Atlantic Ocean 10 minutes after lift-off, while the rocket’s second stage continues toward orbit.