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Blue Origin To Build Its BE-4 Rocket Engine In Alabama, Creating Hundreds of Jobs (theverge.com)
Blue Origin has recently announced its plans to manufacture the company's new rocket engine, the BE-4, at a state-of-the-art facility in Huntsville, Alabama. According to The Verge, the benefits for Blue Origin are both practical and political. From the report: On the surface, it's a seemingly innocuous decision meant to capitalize on Huntsville's decades-long history of rocket development. The city is home to NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, where the Saturn V rocket was developed and where NASA's future massive deep-space rocket, the Space Launch System, will also be worked on. Plus, many private space contractors are based in Huntsville, making spaceflight a key part of the city's economy and a huge jobs creator. It's why Huntsville has been nicknamed Rocket City. But the move is most likely motivated by politics as well, given Blue Origin's plans for the BE-4. The company ultimately hopes to use seven BE-4 engines to power its future massive rocket called the New Glenn, which is supposed to launch sometime before 2020. But that's not the only rocket that the BE-4 could fly on. The United Launch Alliance -- a company responsible for launching most of the satellites for the U.S. military -- is developing a new rocket called Vulcan, and it needs new U.S.-made engines for the vehicle. Blue Origin's move to Huntsville will supposedly generate 342 jobs at the new facility, with salaries averaging $75,000, reports The Verge. Given the city's history, the company should have no problem finding aerospace experts in the area. The only problem that could arise would be if ULA doesn't select the BE-4 as the Vulcan's main engine. "ULA is also considering a second option in case the BE-4 doesn't work out: an engine being developed by longtime manufacturer Aerojet Rocketdyne called the AR-1," reports The Verge. "Aerojet is only meant to be Plan B for ULA. But it has one advantage that Blue Origin didn't have until now: it's building its engine in Huntsville, Alabama -- and that comes with some very key political protection."
Why does TFS mention POLITICS three times without explaining (no, I'm not reading TFA)?
State of the art in Alabama? That means not making them from wood.
Alabama is where the toothbrush was invented. If it had been anywhere else they'd have called it a teethbrush.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Pretty much. An average salary of 75k means that you have a handful of people going home with 6 or even more figures and the rest working double shifts to make ends meet.
Creating jobs is meaningless when that job can't support a family. I don't need an occupation. I need money. I can keep myself occupied just fine, I need no "help" in that respect.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Oh, wait, it's the Bezos haters... well, same crowd - at least in mentality.
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
I'm sure Jeff Bezos is a huge Trump supporter, given his ownership of the Washington Post and all. We all know the Post is such a HUGE fan of the Trump administration.
https://www.ziprecruiter.com/b...
Zoid.com
It's been long-standing policy to spread NASA projects around the country to spread the pork around to ensure Congressional support. In this case, gotta keep those rednecks and NAZIs employed.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
ITAR. There will be no H1Bs working on these missile, er, I mean rocket, engines.
The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
'Before' what, precisely? What are they planning? X-)
I'm most likely way too late in this conversation to get this post viewed, but I'll try anyway...
I live in the Huntsville metropolitan area (nearby, and completely surrounded, Madison).
The cost of living here is *RIDICULOUSLY* cheap. You can easily get a 1,500 sq. ft. starter-house on a half-acre of land for $120,000. Food and other necessities are, likewise, a small fraction of the average Engineer's salary.
And that's almost all there is here! Engineers. If you meet somebody new, you just kinda assume that they're an Engineer. Mechanical, Electrical, Computer, Aerospace. They're everywhere.
I bought my first house in the area just six months after finishing college. Starting salaries in the $50k - $60k range will do you just fine. And advancement is trivial if you just do your job. Either you advance in your starting job, or you can easily job-hop to any of the other tech companies in the area. Change jobs every ~5 years, and (in combination with normal salary increases) you'll easily hit 6-figures around your 10-year-mark. And at that point, you're just starting to get silly. 4,000 sq. ft. houses for $350,000 are easily affordable at that point.
And I also need to mention that almost every tech company out here offers continuing-education incentives. My first company paid for my Master's, and all I had to do was agree to work for them for 2-years after graduating. No big deal.
Long story short, Huntsville is a wonderful place for Engineers of almost any sort. I highly recommend it.
P.S. If you're still in college, Huntsville has tons of internships and co-ops programs. Do it! Graduate with a year+ of real-world experience, and it's even easier to get a job. And that company with which you co-oped is almost certainly going to make you an offer. After all, they had a year-long interview with you. They know *exactly* whether they want you or not.
Given all the snide commentary I see in here it seems that people forgot that Huntsville Alabama is where built a substantial amount of the Apollo program. more to the point parts of the international space station. In fact I had the luxury of having a relative that was working there when they were building it. So I got to see them building the thing before they launched it. Also got to take a few rides through some of the old tests sites that are not open to the public myself. It's a sadly often forgotten bit of history of the US space program.
But that said I can't say how up to day the actual production facilities are, given 8 years of democrat neglect. But it's a safe bet that our old stuff is better than what everyone else has still. Or failing that we can still probably upgrade fast enough to make it true. Assuming adequate political will from both sides of the political isle.