Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos traded barbs about their competing space exploration plans this week in a clash of the space-obsessed billionaires.
Business Insider reports that Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos exchanged comments about each other’s attempts to explore space at a recent event. At an event in Washington D.C., Bezos revealed new plans to put people on the moon displaying a new lunar-landing vehicle which has been named “Blue Moon.”
The Blue Moon lunar lander is being developed by Bezos’ space exploration company Blue Origin and aims to establish a “sustained human presence” on the moon. “It’s time to go back to the moon, this time to stay,” Bezos said. During the event, Bezos appeared to take a swipe at Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s ambitions to colonize Mars. In a slide, Bezos pointed out issues with Musk’s red planet mission and suggested that the moon was a much more realistic ambition.
The slide reportedly noted that a trip to Mars is a “round-trip on the order of years,” adding another issue of “no real-time communication.” Musk turned to Twitter to respond as is his habit. “Competition is good. Results in a better outcome for all,” Musk tweeted initially before taking a swipe at the name of Bezos’ new lunar-lander stating “Putting the word ‘Blue’ on a ball is questionable branding.”
Musk later tweeted a picture of Bezos standing in front of the new lunar-landing vehicle, commenting “Oh stop teasing, Jeff ” Musk has previously taken swipes at Bezos, branding him a copycat for planning to launch thousands of satellites that would deliver high-speed internet across the world. SpaceX was reportedly working on a similar project.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan or email him at lnolan@breitbart.com