Jeff Bezos offers a $2 billion bribe from NASA for lunar landing gear

Washington | Billionaire Jeff Bezos, owner of space company Blue Origin, offered NASA a $2 billion cut Monday to allow his company to build a lunar landing system.

The US space agency’s contract for a manned landing system, worth $2.9 billion, was awarded to rival SpaceX in April, but Blue Origin and a third company, Dynetics, filed complaints awaiting a decision from the US Government Accounts Office.

The United States aims to return to the Moon by 2024 as part of the Artemis program, then use the lessons to prepare for a manned mission to Mars in the 2030s.

Dans une lettre ouverte à la NASA, lundi, Jeff Bezos a estimé que son offre permettrait de « combler le déficit de financement » qui a conduit l’agence spatiale américaine à ne choisir qu’une seule entreprise au lieu de seraient, in competition.

Since its failed NASA bid, Blue Origin has led frantic pressure to overturn the decision, prompting the US Senate to pass a bill approving $10 billion for a manned landing system for the government.

But the text is still being debated in the House of Representatives, and its critics have described it as a “bezos bailout.”

According to Jeff Bezos, one of the advantages of the Blue Moon landing system, built by his company, is the use of liquid hydrogen as fuel, which can be extracted from lunar ice, according to NASA’s plans to use the moon to refuel rockets. During operations in the solar system.

He added that the company will test its landing craft in Earth orbit at its own expense.

“We stand ready to help NASA mitigate its technical risks, resolve its budget constraints, and put the Artemis program back on a more competitive, credible, and sustainable path,” concluded Jeff Bezos.

It is not certain that his intervention at the last moment would overturn the result of the assignment.