Blue Origin, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday because of unfavorable weather conditions at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Reasons
Precipitation and a ground system issue led to initial delays, then came thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window ended, leaving managers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Competition between Bezos' firm and Musk's space company has been intensifying in the past few months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To ease traffic in the skies amid the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is limiting private space launches starting 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 soon as Wednesday within a time slot of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter New Glenn rocket will carry NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, in an effort to examine the Martian atmospheric past with the long-term goal of human exploration.
The mission will also serve as a key test of whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would prove a technical breakthrough for the firm if successful.
Previous Flight
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was considered a achievement, as its payload achieved orbit and successfully performed tests.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be recoverable, did not stick its touchdown on a platform in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Recovery Efforts
For this new mission Blue Origin will make another attempt to land the booster stage.
Thus far, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Industry Competition
The competing companies of billionaires Bezos and Musk are engaged in a private sector space competition that recently escalated, as NASA opened up bids for its lunar exploration program, complaining that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has seen the government pile pressure on NASA to accelerate its timeline to send a crewed mission to the lunar surface amid a race with China.
More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “expand our options with regard to launch.”
“More launches means more ideas in space,” a former NASA chief technologist said. “It can’t be a negative to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
