{"id":261043,"date":"2025-09-28T10:25:13","date_gmt":"2025-09-28T10:25:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/261043\/"},"modified":"2025-09-28T10:25:13","modified_gmt":"2025-09-28T10:25:13","slug":"blue-origins-new-space-coast-moon-lander-factory-open-for-business-orlando-sentinel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/261043\/","title":{"rendered":"Blue Origin\u2019s new Space Coast moon lander factory open for business \u2013 Orlando Sentinel"},"content":{"rendered":"

MERRITT ISLAND \u2014 Jeff Bezos\u2019 Blue Origin has sunk $3 billion to build up its manufacturing plant and launch pad on the Space Coast in the last decade. On Friday, it invited visitors for a rare media tour of the plant where it constructs its heavy-lift New Glenn rockets while touting its latest addition: the facility where the company will construct its Blue Moon lander to take astronauts back to the lunar surface.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to win this space race. This is the reason why we\u2019re so invested,\u201d said U.S. Rep. Mike Haridopolos, chair of the House Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee, who persuaded Blue Origin to open the factory floor of its massive Brevard County facility. \u201cYou can\u2019t help but be confident after seeing firsthand what\u2019s happening here at Blue Origin.\u201d<\/p>\n

Blue Origin\u00a0and Elon Musk\u2019s SpaceX are the competing commercial companies to give NASA working human landing systems for its Artemis program. SpaceX\u2019s Starship is contracted to be the lander for both Artemis III and IV, while Blue Origin\u2019s Blue Moon Mark 2 lander is tapped to fly on Artemis V.<\/p>\n

The just-completed Lunar Plant 1, which aims to employ at least another 1,500 people on top of the 4,000 already on the job in Florida, is where the Mark 2 will take shape. As Haridopolos noted, the tour made what at times has seemed like a pie-in-the-sky effort into something impressively real.<\/p>\n

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The first test article assembled and tested in Lunar Plant 1: our Lunar Transporter sunshield! \u2600\ufe0f\ud83d\udee1\ufe0f <\/p>\n

Designed to be one of the largest deployable shields in space, it will protect both our Transporter and Blue Moon MK2 Crew Lander from radiation while the two vehicles are\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/rhyPLmypJx<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Blue Origin (@blueorigin) September 22, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s where the Artemis landers will be built,\u201d said John Couluris, Blue Origin\u2019s vice president of its lunar permanence division. \u201cIt says lunar specifically, so no one has any doubt what we\u2019re doing here in Florida, that we\u2019re building our lunar landers here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like all the buildings at the sprawling campus just across from the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Center, it\u2019s painted in a vivid blue. It adds another 200,000 square feet to the more than 3 million square feet of space overall at the site.<\/p>\n

\"BlueBlue Origin’s senior vice president of lunar permanence John Couluris speaks, right, aside U.S. Rep. Mike Haridopolos during a tour of Blue Origin’s manufacturing site in Merritt Island adjacent Kennedy Space Center. Behind them is a mockup of the company’s Mark 1 Lunar Lander. (Richard Tribou\/Orlando Sentinel)<\/p>\n

While the new plant is aimed at constructing a crewed version of its lander, Blue Origin already has a second plant up and running near Port Canaveral called Lunar Plant 2 making the uncrewed Mark 1 version.<\/p>\n

And it has plans to send that to the moon this year. Couluris said Mark 1 is headed to Houston first for a review at NASA\u2019s Johnson Space Center\u2019s thermal vacuum chamber.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to check it out, make sure it\u2019s good, come out here, do some tests, integrate to New Glenn and then launch by the end of the year, knock on wood,\u201d he said. \u201cBut again, that\u2019s that\u2019s assuming everything goes well. We want to make sure we have a successful mission.\u201d<\/p>\n

New Glenn is the company\u2019s heavy-lift rocket that made its debut flight this past January from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station\u2019s Launch Complex 36. The rocket\u2019s second flight<\/a> could come before the end of October with the Mark 1 lunar flight in line as the third mission.<\/p>\n

The 322-foot-tall rocket itself is constructed at the largest building on the Merritt Island facility, a 750,000-square-foot factory floor that runs the length of 2 1\/2 football fields.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the only place where the rockets and landers are built, right near the launch pad,\u201d Couluris said. \u201cSo we\u2019re not shipping across country. We\u2019re not taking delays in transport. But also the people designing and building the vehicles will be operating the vehicles. So you\u2019ve got that knowledge transfer that \u2014 \u2018I know what that switch does or what that computer is doing\u2019 \u2014 and if I have an issue on the pad, the person who actually did it can go out there.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also said it\u2019s invaluable to keep the engineers in Florida where the hardware is made.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s so much to be learned by actually touching hardware, going out on the floor, drilling a hole, seeing what people on the floor are doing.\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The New Glenn assembly line spreads out across a stark white floor under hundreds of bright ceiling lights. It is filled with blue-and-gold painted steel contraptions, lined up like a child\u2019s army of Lego creations and holding dozens of rocket parts in various states of completion.<\/p>\n

The sounds of pneumatic drills and power saws shearing metal on metal screech in the distance as the occasional alarm blares and massive gantries move along rails more than 100 feet above the floor.<\/p>\n

\"BlueBlue Origin’s senior vice president of lunar permanence John Couluris talks about the company’s moon plans backed by a mockup of the company’s Blue Origin’s Mark 1 Lunar Lander during a tour of the company’s manufacturing site in Merritt Island adjacent Kennedy Space Center. (Richard Tribou\/Orlando Sentinel)<\/p>\n

\u201cAs you see from the buildings and the infrastructure we\u2019re building here, the Space Coast is perfectly situated to open up the rest of the solar system,\u201d Couluris said. \u201cIt starts with low-Earth orbit. It continues on to the moon, which is my program, and then continues on to Mars and the asteroid belts and beyond.\u201d<\/p>\n

Haridopolos, in his first term in Congress<\/a>, praised Blue Origin\u2019s investment on the Space Coast noting Lunar Plant 1 only took 18 months to finish construction.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s an eye opener, and I\u2019m just so impressed how quickly they ramped up,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He also pointed out the companies are hiring local young people.<\/p>\n

\u201cA few weeks ago, I was at Melbourne High School, Eau Gallie High School, Palm Bay High School,\u201d he said. \u201cThese kids are getting these certifications, and they come right into these jobs and make $80,000 to $100,000 out of high school. And these are not jobs. These are careers.\u201d<\/p>\n

And the investments bode well for the Space Coast\u2019s future, he said.<\/p>\n

\"OneOne of the new manufacturing buildings at Blue Origin’s massive campus in Merritt Island is dedicated to its crewed Blue Moon and uncrewed Mark 1 lunar landers. (Richard Tribou\/Orlando Sentinel)<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you invest maybe tens of billions of dollars when it\u2019s all over, they\u2019re not going anywhere. And so these aren\u2019t fly-by-night jobs,\u201d he said. \u201cThese guys recognize the bottom line, and they\u2019re not going to make this multibillion-dollar investment unless they felt like there\u2019s a commercial opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Blue Origin\u2019s part, it\u2019s ready to support NASA for Artemis V, but would be willing to speed things up if SpaceX faced delays, Couluris said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf NASA wants to accelerate us to go faster, then we would ramp that up faster,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s right now gauged on Artemis V. If they want us to go earlier, we would engage a lot faster.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Originally Published: September 27, 2025 at 11:29 AM EDT<\/p>\n