The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday due to unfavorable weather factors at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Reasons
Rainfall and a ground system issue led to initial delays, followed by thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window closed, forcing managers to reschedule the rocket’s planned second mission.
Competition between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in the past few months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To relieve airspace congestion amid the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from Monday.
Following the cancellation of the mission, Blue Origin said on Sunday evening that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was aiming for another attempt as soon as midweek within a window of 2.50pm to 4.17pm Eastern Standard time.
Launch Goals
When it eventually launches, the 98-meter New Glenn rocket will carry the US space agency's Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, in an effort to examine the planet’s climate history with the long-term goal of human exploration.
The mission will also serve as a crucial trial of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would prove a technical breakthrough for the firm if successful.
Previous Flight
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was marked as a success, as its payload achieved orbit and successfully performed tests.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a platform in the Atlantic, and instead was lost during the return phase.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort the launch provider will try once more to recover the booster stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has managed that accomplishment.
Space Race
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, noting that one company was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has seen the government pile pressure on the agency to speed up its timeline to send a crewed mission to the Moon amid a race with the Asian nation.
More rivalry between the two firms could “expand our options with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means more ideas in orbit,” a former NASA chief technologist said. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
