The aerospace company, founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday because of adverse weather factors at the Florida launch site.
Mission Postponement Reasons
Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground caused early setbacks, then came cumulus cloud cover as the narrow time frame for launch closed, forcing mission controllers to reschedule the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Competition between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in recent months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To relieve airspace congestion during the government funding gap, the aviation regulator is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs from the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the launch, Blue Origin said late Sunday that, in coordination with the regulatory body, it was aiming for another attempt as early as Wednesday within a window of afternoon hours EST.
Launch Goals
When it eventually launches, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will transport the US space agency's two Mars-bound probes to Mars, in an effort to study the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of human exploration.
The mission will also act as a key test of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the firm if successful.
Previous Flight
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was considered a success, as its payload reached space and successfully performed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was designed as reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a platform in the ocean, and instead was lost during descent.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort the launch provider will try once more to recover the booster stage.
Thus far, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Industry Competition
The competing companies of tycoons Musk and Bezos are locked in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as the space agency began accepting bids for its lunar exploration program, noting that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has involved the administration push the agency to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon in competition against China.
More rivalry between the two firms could “expand our options with regard to liftoff.”
“More launches means greater innovation in space,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
