The aerospace company, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, had to postpone the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend due to unfavorable weather factors at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Reasons
Precipitation and a ground system issue led to initial delays, then came thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window closed, forcing mission controllers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been intensifying in recent months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To relieve traffic in the skies during the US federal government shutdown, the aviation regulator is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the launch, the company announced late Sunday that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was aiming for another attempt as early as midweek within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm EST.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter New Glenn rocket will carry the US space agency's Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, in an effort to study the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of human exploration.
Blue Origin’s launch will also act as a key test of whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would represent a major advancement for the company if successful.
Earlier Mission
The rocket's first launch in January was marked as a success, as its cargo achieved orbit and successfully performed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission Blue Origin will try once more to land the first stage.
Thus far, only SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.
Space Race
The competing companies of billionaires Musk and Bezos are locked in a private sector space competition that recently escalated, as the space agency began accepting proposals for its planned moon mission, complaining that one company was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has seen the administration push NASA to accelerate its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with the Asian nation.
More rivalry between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means greater innovation in orbit,” an ex-agency official said. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
