Blue Origin, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the eagerly awaited launch of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday because of adverse meteorological factors at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Reasons
Precipitation and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the narrow time frame for launch ended, forcing mission controllers to reschedule the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been intensifying in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To ease airspace congestion amid the government funding gap, the aviation regulator is limiting private space launches starting the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the launch, the company said on Sunday evening that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was aiming for a new try as soon as Wednesday within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm EST.
Mission Objectives
When it eventually launches, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will carry the US space agency's two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, to examine the planet’s climate history with the long-term goal of human exploration.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a crucial trial of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the firm if accomplished.
Previous Flight
The rocket's first launch in the start of the year was marked as a success, as its payload reached space and successfully performed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be recoverable, did not stick its landing on a platform in the ocean, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Recovery Efforts
For this new mission the launch provider will try once more to land the booster stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has managed that accomplishment.
Space Race
The competing companies of billionaires Bezos and Musk are engaged in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as the space agency began accepting bids for its lunar exploration program, complaining that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
Donald Trump’s second term has seen the administration push the agency to accelerate its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon in competition against the Asian nation.
Increased competition between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “expand our options with regard to launch.”
“More launches means greater innovation in orbit,” an ex-agency official said. “It isn't a bad thing to have Blue Origin, even trailing behind.”
