The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to postpone the highly anticipated launch of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend due to adverse meteorological factors at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Causes
Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground led to early setbacks, followed by thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window ended, leaving mission controllers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in recent months.
New Launch Window
To relieve airspace congestion amid the US federal government shutdown, the Federal Aviation Administration is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs from Monday.
After scrubbing the mission, Blue Origin announced late Sunday that, in coordination with the FAA, it was aiming for another attempt as soon as Wednesday within a window of afternoon hours EST.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter New Glenn rocket will carry NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to Mars, to examine the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of human exploration.
The mission will also act as a crucial trial of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the firm if successful.
Earlier Mission
The rocket's first launch in January was marked as a achievement, as its payload achieved orbit and completed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be reusable, did not stick its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and instead was lost during descent.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission Blue Origin will make another attempt to recover the first stage.
Thus far, only Musk’s company SpaceX has managed that accomplishment.
Industry Competition
The competing companies of billionaires Bezos and Musk are locked in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as NASA began accepting proposals for its lunar exploration program, complaining that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
Donald Trump’s second term has involved the government pile pressure on NASA to accelerate its progress to launch astronauts to the Moon in competition against the Asian nation.
More rivalry between the two firms 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 bad thing to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
