Blue Origin, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday because of adverse weather conditions at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Causes
Rainfall and a ground system issue caused early setbacks, followed by thick clouds as the narrow time frame for launch closed, leaving managers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
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 Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the mission, the company announced late Sunday that, working alongside the FAA, it was targeting another attempt as early as Wednesday within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm Eastern Standard time.
Launch Goals
When it eventually launches, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will carry NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, to examine the planet’s climate history with the long-term goal of human exploration.
The mission will also serve as a key test of whether it can achieve booster recovery, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the firm if accomplished.
Previous Flight
The rocket's first launch in the start of the year was marked as a achievement, as its payload reached space and successfully performed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be recoverable, failed to make its landing on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and instead was lost during the return phase.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission Blue Origin will make another attempt to recover the first stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has managed that accomplishment.
Industry Competition
The competing companies 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 planned moon mission, complaining that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has involved the administration push NASA to accelerate its progress to send a crewed mission to the lunar surface in competition against China.
Increased competition between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “expand our options with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means greater innovation in space,” an ex-agency official stated. “It isn't a negative to have Blue Origin, even trailing behind.”
