The aerospace company, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend because of unfavorable meteorological conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Causes
Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground led to initial delays, then came cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window closed, leaving mission controllers to reschedule the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Competition between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been intensifying in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To relieve airspace congestion amid the government funding gap, the aviation regulator is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs from the beginning of the week.
After scrubbing the launch, the company announced late Sunday that, working alongside the FAA, it was targeting another attempt as early as midweek within a window of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
When it eventually launches, the 322-foot tall launch vehicle 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 eventual hope of sending people there.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a key test of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would prove a major advancement for the company if accomplished.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in the start of the year was marked as a achievement, as its payload reached space and completed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be recoverable, failed to make its landing on a platform in the ocean, and instead was lost during the return phase.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission Blue Origin will try once more to recover the first stage.
Thus far, only Musk’s company SpaceX has managed that feat.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of billionaires Musk and Bezos are locked in a private sector space competition that has grown more intense lately, as NASA opened up proposals for its planned moon mission, noting that one company was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has involved the government pile pressure on NASA to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with China.
More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means more ideas in orbit,” an ex-agency official said. “It can’t be a negative to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
