The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, had to postpone the eagerly awaited liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday because of unfavorable weather conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Causes
Precipitation and a technical problem on the ground caused early setbacks, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window ended, leaving managers to reschedule the rocket’s planned second mission.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To ease traffic in the skies during the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from Monday.
Following the cancellation of the mission, the company said late Sunday that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was targeting a new try as soon as midweek within a time slot of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry the US space agency's Escapade twin spacecraft to Mars, to examine the planet’s climate history with the long-term goal of sending people there.
Blue Origin’s launch will also act as a crucial trial of whether it can achieve booster recovery, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the firm if successful.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in the start of the year was marked as a success, as its payload reached space and completed tests.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be reusable, did not stick its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during the return phase.
Recovery Efforts
In its second effort the launch provider will try once more to land the booster stage.
Thus far, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of billionaires Bezos and Musk are locked in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as NASA began accepting bids for its planned moon mission, complaining that one company was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has involved the government push the agency to speed up its timeline to send a crewed mission to the Moon in competition against China.
More rivalry between the two firms could “expand our options with regard to launch.”
“More launches means more ideas in orbit,” an ex-agency official stated. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
