James Dean

FLORIDA TODAY

Blue Origin hopes to break ground before summer on a Merritt Island rocket manufacturing facility, and says Florida also is in the running to win production of the company’s powerful BE-4 rocket engines.

“Florida’s in the mix,” said Scott Henderson, Blue Origin’s orbital launch site director, in a presentation to the National Space Club Florida Committee on Tuesday at the Radisson Resort at the Port in Cape Canaveral.

The Kent, Washington, company backed by billionaire Amazon.com founder and CEO Jeff Bezos hopes to be ready to launch an orbital rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station’s Launch Complex 36 by 2019.

Blue Origin's goal is to dramatically lower the cost of human spaceflight.

Blue Origin will build and launch rockets in Brevard

Its launch and manufacturing activity are expected to bring more than 300 high-paying jobs to the Space Coast and more than $200 million in infrastructure investment.

The rocket factory will be located at Exploration Park, just south of Kennedy Space Center on Merritt Island. It will be the first time Brevard County has not just launched rockets but built them, too.

Blue Origin also is developing two engines, the BE-3 and BE-4, to power its own and other companies' rockets, including the Vulcan vehicle United Launch Alliance is designing to replace the Atlas V.

"When people ask me what stands out about Blue, my answer is simple: We’re builders," said Henderson.

He said Florida won a tight competition with several other states for Blue Origin’s orbital rocket building and launch operations, and “it was not an easy win.”

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While infrastructure and a skilled work force helped set the Space Coast apart, Henderson also credited a concerted effort to make the Cape more appealing to commercial operations, not just the government’s defense and exploration missions.

“The proof will be in the pudding, but there was really an aggressive push there,” he said.

The same factors will influence the company’s choice about where to build methane-fueled BE-4 engines producing 550,000 pounds of thrust, a decision that could be made this year.

“The same kinds of things that carried Florida in the launch site decision will make Florida very competitive,” said Henderson. “But this one’s got a lot less constraints, and a lot more people interested.”

Blue Origin last month became the first company to re-fly a vertically launched, suborbital rocket. At the company’s private range in Texas, the New Shepard booster launched an unmanned capsule on a suborbital spaceflight and then landed, repeating a feat achieved in November.

“Throughout space history, most rockets have been thrown away after their first use,” said Henderson. “The launch paradigm has now changed forever with the arrival of reusability.”

The suborbital New Shepard system is a precursor to the larger orbital rockets that will launch from Florida.

“We’re building Blue Origin’s future here in Florida,” Henderson said.

Contact Dean at 321-242-3668 orjdean@floridatoday.com.And follow on Twitter at@flatoday_jdeanand on Facebook atfacebook.com/jamesdeanspace.