The aerospace company, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, had to postpone the highly anticipated liftoff of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday due to adverse meteorological conditions at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Causes
Rainfall and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, then came thick clouds as the narrow time frame for launch ended, forcing managers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.
Competition between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been intensifying in the past few months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To ease airspace congestion amid the US federal government shutdown, the aviation regulator is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the mission, Blue Origin said late Sunday that, in coordination with the regulatory body, it was targeting another attempt as soon as Wednesday within a time slot of afternoon hours EST.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to Mars, in an effort to study the planet’s climate history with the long-term goal of human exploration.
The mission will also serve as a key test of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would represent a major advancement 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 successfully performed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be reusable, did not stick its landing on a platform in the ocean, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort the launch provider will try once more to recover the first stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of billionaires Bezos and Musk are engaged in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as the space agency opened up bids for its planned moon mission, complaining that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
Donald Trump’s second term has involved the government push NASA to speed up its progress to launch astronauts to the lunar surface amid a race with China.
Increased competition between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “expand our options with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means more ideas in space,” an ex-agency official said. “It can’t be a negative to have Blue Origin, even trailing behind.”
