Jeff Bezos has congratulated his billionaire space race rival and fellow billionaire Elon Musk on yesterday’s SpaceX launch, which saw the first all-civilian crew fly 360 miles above the Earth.
Bezos tweeted a rare praise for SpaceX’s successful launch, his first since February 2020.
“Congratulations to [Elon Musk] and the [SpaceX] team on their successful Inspiration4 launch last night. Another step towards a future where space is accessible to all of us.”
Elon Musk responded with a short, curt “Thank you”
This exchange was unexpected to many who followed the so-called space race among the billionaires. Musk and Bezos were tussling to create the first commercially space tourism company with SpaceX, Blue Origin and SpaceX respectively.
(Image: BLUE ORIGIN/AFP via Getty Images)
Blue Origin is currently engaged suing NASA for granting a $2.39 billion moon lander contract to Musk’s SpaceX company.
(Image: NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Musk mocked Bezos for the legal case in a tweet, saying the former Amazon CEO “retired in order to pursue a full-time job filing lawsuits against SpaceX…”
This week’s SpaceX launch saw four civilians travel in a pilotless shuttle far out into Earth’s orbit without any professional astronauts onboard. They are currently located 360 miles above Earth’s surface, which means Musk’s three-day mission has covered more ground than the International Space Station (ISS) and the Hubble Telescope.
(Image: Getty Images)
Meanwhile, Bezos’ Blue Origins launch in July didn’t even technically make it to space. It traveled to the edge Earth’s stratosphere, about 66miles above the ground, for only four minutes. This was also not the first private civilian spaceflight. Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson won the race on Virgin Galactic’s VSS Unity rocket plane. Musk mocked Bezos’s’suborbital’ travel at the time.
Twitter users quickly pointed out the irony in the billionaire couple’s warmer exchange. “Look at you guys being all friendly,” wrote MrBeastIt is available at: “See – you don’t have to put down your competition,” said David Gokhshtein. “We can all work together to achieve great things.”
(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
Others were more critical. “Jeff after using your time and resources these last several months to sue NASA and impede SpaceX’s progress this comes off as disingenuous,” wrote itsALLrisky. “Wishing you would reconsider your lobbyist and lawsuit-based approach to space exploration so we can help SpaceX push humanity forward”.
Although Bezos may have complimented Musk for making space travel “accessible”, it doesn’t appear that the cost of a ticket will drop anytime soon. In June, a seat on Blue Origins’ New Shepard sold for $28 million. SpaceX’s Dragon Shuttle seats cost $55million. Virgin Galactic is a great bargain if you are looking to travel to near space for as low as $250,000.