During his second inauguration speech, President Donald Trump endorsed a Mars mission as a part of America’s push into new horizons.

Named after the first American to orbit Earth, the New Glenn rocket blasted off from Florida, soaring from the same pad used to launch NASA’s Mariner and Pioneer spacecraft a half-century ago.

Jeff Bezos, the second richest man in the world, successfully blasted off a 320-foot-tall rocket ship made by his Blue Origin company from Cape Canaveral, Florida, in the early hours of the morning. It made the company the first to successfully reach orbit on its first launch of an orbital-class rocket.

Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket has officially launched, marking a pivotal moment in Jeff Bezos' ongoing rivalry with SpaceX and setting the stage for future space exploration. The rocket, launched from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station,

The mission, the culmination of a decade-long, multi-billion-dollar development journey, will include an attempt to land New Glenn’s first stage booster on a sea-fairing barge in the Atlantic Ocean 10 minutes after lift-off, while the rocket’s second stage continues toward orbit.

Tesla CEO and Amazon founder vie for dominance of satellite launch market and could influence Nasa plans to return to Moon

"My own opinion is that we should do both – we need to go to the moon and we should go to Mars," Bezos said, when asked if he was concerned about changes to NASA's moon program. Jeff Bezos speaks about his flight on Blue Origin’s New Shepard into space ...

In recent years, Space X has been a clear winner in space tech, even managing to catch a booster for the most powerful rocket ever built on a pair of ‘chopsticks’ last year, and stepping in to rescue two astronauts still stranded in space after the Boeing Starliner which carried them there was deemed not safe enough to take them home.

Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket launch marks a significant step in Jeff Bezos' rivalry with SpaceX and future Mars exploration.- Watch Video on English Oneindia

Jeff Bezos, founder of Blue Origin, downplays fears that Elon Musk’s ties to President-elect Trump might undermine his company. Bezos believes Musk’s

Bezos’ space company Blue Origin started at about the same time as Musk’s SpaceX but since then Musk’s firm has launched more than 400 of its Falcon 9 rockets into orbit and is testing out its giant Starship rocket which it hopes will send astronauts to the Moon and one day possibly on to Mars.