The aerospace company, founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated launch of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend due to adverse meteorological conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Reasons
Precipitation and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, then came cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window closed, forcing managers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been heating up in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To ease traffic in the skies amid the US federal government shutdown, the Federal Aviation Administration is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs starting Monday.
After scrubbing the launch, the company announced on Sunday evening that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was aiming for another attempt as early as midweek within a time slot of afternoon hours EST.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter 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 act as a crucial trial of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would prove a major advancement for the company if successful.
Previous Flight
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in the start of the year was marked as a success, as its payload achieved orbit and successfully performed tests.
But its first-stage booster, which was designed as reusable, did not stick its landing on a platform in the ocean, and instead was lost during descent.
Recovery Efforts
For this new mission the launch provider will make another attempt to recover the booster stage.
Thus far, only Musk’s company SpaceX has managed that feat.
Space Race
The competing companies of billionaires Bezos and Musk are locked in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as the space agency opened up proposals for its planned moon mission, complaining that one company was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has involved the administration push NASA to accelerate its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon in competition against China.
Increased competition between the two firms could “expand our options with regard to liftoff.”
“More launches means greater innovation in orbit,” an ex-agency official said. “It isn't a bad thing to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
