The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to postpone the highly anticipated launch of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday because of adverse meteorological conditions at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Causes
Rainfall 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 push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been intensifying in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To ease traffic in the skies during the US federal government shutdown, the Federal Aviation Administration is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs starting the beginning of the week.
After scrubbing the launch, Blue Origin announced late Sunday that, working alongside the FAA, it was aiming for another attempt as early as midweek within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm EST.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 322-foot tall launch vehicle will transport NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to Mars, to examine the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of human exploration.
The mission will also act as a key test of whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would prove a technical breakthrough for the company if successful.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was considered a success, as its payload reached space and successfully performed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was designed as reusable, did not stick its landing on a ocean-based target in the ocean, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort Blue Origin will try once more to recover the booster stage.
Thus far, only SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Space Race
The competing companies of billionaires Musk and Bezos are engaged in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as the space agency began accepting proposals for its planned moon mission, noting that one company was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has seen the administration push NASA to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts to the lunar surface amid a race with the Asian nation.
More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “expand our options with regard to liftoff.”
“More launches means more ideas in space,” an ex-agency official stated. “It can’t be a negative to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
