Blue Origin, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to postpone the highly anticipated launch of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday due to unfavorable meteorological factors at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Causes
Precipitation and a technical problem on the ground led to early setbacks, then came thick clouds as the narrow time frame for launch ended, forcing managers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Competition between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been intensifying in recent months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To relieve airspace congestion amid the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs starting the beginning of the week.
After scrubbing the launch, Blue Origin announced on Sunday evening that, working alongside the FAA, it was targeting a new try as early as midweek within a time slot of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will carry NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to Mars, to study the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of sending people there.
The mission will also serve as a key test of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would prove a major advancement for the firm if accomplished.
Earlier Mission
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, did not stick its landing on a platform in the Atlantic, and instead was lost during descent.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort the launch provider will make another attempt to recover the booster stage.
Thus far, only SpaceX has managed that accomplishment.
Space Race
The competing companies of billionaires Musk and Bezos are locked in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as the space agency opened up proposals for its planned moon mission, complaining that SpaceX was lagging behind.
The current administration has involved the government push NASA to accelerate its progress to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with China.
More rivalry between the two firms could “expand our options with regard to liftoff.”
“More launches means greater innovation in orbit,” an ex-agency official stated. “It isn't a negative to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”
