The aerospace company, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend due to adverse meteorological conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Causes
Precipitation and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, then came cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window closed, forcing mission controllers to reschedule the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Competition between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been intensifying in the past few months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To ease airspace congestion amid the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from Monday.
After scrubbing the launch, Blue Origin said on Sunday evening that, in coordination with the FAA, it was targeting another attempt as soon as Wednesday within a time slot of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.
Launch Goals
When it eventually launches, 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 key test of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the firm if accomplished.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was marked as a achievement, as its cargo achieved orbit and completed tests.
But its main rocket section, which was designed as recoverable, failed to make its landing on a ocean-based target in the ocean, and instead was lost during descent.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission Blue Origin will make another attempt to land the first stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.
Space Race
The competing companies of billionaires Bezos and Musk are locked in a private sector space competition that recently escalated, as the space agency opened up bids for its lunar exploration program, noting that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
Donald Trump’s second term has seen the administration pile pressure on NASA to accelerate its timeline to send a crewed mission 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.”
“Additional missions means greater innovation in orbit,” an ex-agency official said. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
