Blue Origin, founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday due to unfavorable weather conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Reasons
Precipitation and a technical problem on the ground caused early setbacks, followed by thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window closed, forcing managers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Competition between Bezos' firm and Musk's space company has been heating up in recent months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To relieve traffic in the skies amid the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs starting Monday.
After scrubbing the mission, Blue Origin announced late Sunday that, in coordination with the regulatory body, it was aiming for another attempt as soon as Wednesday within a window of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, in an effort to examine the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of sending people there.
The mission will also serve as a key test of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would prove a major advancement for the firm if successful.
Previous Flight
The rocket's first launch in January was marked as a success, as its cargo achieved orbit and completed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was designed as reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a platform in the ocean, and instead was lost during descent.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission the launch provider will make another attempt to recover the first stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Space Race
Rival firms of tycoons Bezos and Musk are engaged in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as the space agency began accepting bids for its planned moon mission, noting that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
Donald Trump’s second term has involved the administration pile pressure on NASA to accelerate its progress to send a crewed mission to the lunar surface amid a race with the Asian nation.
More rivalry between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“More launches means more ideas in orbit,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It isn't a negative to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”
