Blue Origin to launch from Cape Canaveral this decade

The aerospace company Blue Origin, headed by Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos, will begin launching to space from Cape Canaveral, Florida, later this decade, officials said Tuesday.

After losing a bid in 2013 to lease the historic launch pad 39A at Cape Canaveral Florida to rival SpaceX, Blue Origin announced it would make its home nearby at the NASA center's launch complex 36.

"Today we are thrilled to be coming to the Sunshine State for a new era of exploration," Bezos told a press conference.

He said 145 launches "thundered into space from here," including the Mariner missions which were the first US spacecrafts to visit other planets; Pioneer 10, the first spacecraft to travel through the asteroid belt; and Surveyor 1, the first US spacecraft to land softly on the Moon. Its last launch took place in 2005.

"The pad has stood silent for more than 10 years. Too long. We can't wait to fix that," Bezos said.

"We will be launching from here later this decade."

The arrival of Blue Origin to the area known as Florida's Space Coast was expected to create 330 jobs, according to governor Rick Scott who congratulated Bezos for his "success."

Though Bezos revealed few details about Blue Origin's plans, he said there would be a "21st century production facility where we will focus on manufacturing a reusable fleet of orbital launchers."

He also said a vehicle assembly building would be located near the launch pad in order to make it easier to "process and transport really big rockets."

He said the company's US-made BE-4 rocket engine would undergo tests at the pad, and would eventually power United Launch Alliance's Vulcan rocket.

Blue Origin's New Shepard spacecraft is built to fly just to the edge of space, in suborbit, and the company is working on a launch system to send astronauts to orbit.

SpaceX, which made history as the first private company to send cargo to the International Space Station, blasts off its Falcon 9 rockets from the Cape Canaveral launch pad that sent the Apollo missions to the moon.