The aerospace company, founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, had to postpone the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend because of adverse weather factors at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Reasons
Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground caused initial delays, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the narrow time frame for launch 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 the past few months.
New Launch Window
To relieve airspace congestion amid the government funding gap, the aviation regulator is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from Monday.
Following the cancellation of the launch, Blue Origin said on Sunday evening that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was targeting another attempt as soon as Wednesday within a time slot of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will transport NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, in an effort to examine the Martian atmospheric past with the long-term goal of sending people there.
The mission will also act as a key test of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would prove a major advancement for the firm if successful.
Earlier Mission
The rocket's first launch in the start of the year was marked as a achievement, as its payload reached space and successfully performed tests.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be recoverable, failed to make its touchdown on a platform in the Atlantic, and instead was lost during descent.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort the launch provider will make another attempt to recover the first stage.
Thus far, only SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of billionaires Musk and Bezos are engaged in a private sector space competition that has grown more intense lately, as NASA opened up bids for its planned moon mission, complaining that one company was lagging behind.
The current administration has seen the government push NASA to speed up its timeline to send a crewed mission to the Moon in competition against China.
More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“Additional missions means greater innovation in space,” an ex-agency official stated. “It isn't a negative to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”
