The aerospace company, founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was forced to postpone the eagerly awaited liftoff of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday because of adverse weather conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Causes
Rainfall and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window closed, leaving managers to reschedule the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in recent months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To ease airspace congestion amid the US federal government shutdown, the aviation regulator is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs starting Monday.
Following the cancellation of the mission, the company announced late Sunday that, working alongside the FAA, it was aiming for another attempt as early as Wednesday within a window of afternoon hours EST.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will carry NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to Mars, to examine the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of human exploration.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a key test of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would prove a technical breakthrough for the firm if successful.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in the start of the year was considered a success, as its cargo achieved orbit and successfully performed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be reusable, did not stick its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission the launch provider will try once more to recover the booster stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of billionaires Bezos and Musk are engaged in a private sector space competition that recently escalated, as the space agency opened up proposals for its lunar exploration program, noting that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has seen the government pile pressure on NASA to accelerate its timeline to send a crewed mission to the Moon in competition against China.
More rivalry between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“More launches means greater innovation in space,” an ex-agency official said. “It isn't a negative to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
