Blue Origin Awarded Its First NASA Interplanetary Launch Contract for Mars Mission

Amazon and Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos addresses the media about the New Shepard rocket booster and Crew Capsule mockup at the 33rd Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Colo., on April 5, 2017. Isaiah J. Downing/Reuters

WASHINGTON—Blue Origin, the private space company founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was awarded its first interplanetary NASA contract on Thursday to launch a mission next year to study the magnetic field around Mars, the U.S. space agency and company said.

Plans call for Blue Origin’s recently developed New Glenn heavy-lift rocket to blast off with NASA’s dual-spacecraft ESCAPADE mission in late 2024 from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, the agency said.