Blue Origin, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated launch of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday because of unfavorable weather conditions at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Reasons
Precipitation and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, then came cumulus cloud cover as the narrow time frame for launch ended, forcing mission controllers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Competition 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 government funding gap, the aviation regulator is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs from Monday.
Following the cancellation of the mission, Blue Origin announced late Sunday that, working alongside the FAA, it was aiming for another attempt as early as Wednesday within a window of 2.50pm to 4.17pm Eastern Standard time.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will carry the US space agency's Escapade twin spacecraft to Mars, in an effort to study the planet’s climate history with the long-term goal of sending people there.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a key test of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would prove a major advancement for the company if successful.
Previous Flight
The rocket's first launch in January 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 ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during the return phase.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort Blue Origin will make another attempt to recover the first stage.
Thus far, only Musk’s company SpaceX has managed that accomplishment.
Space Race
The competing companies of tycoons Bezos and Musk are engaged 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 lagging behind.
Donald Trump’s second term has involved the administration push the agency to accelerate its progress to send a crewed mission to the Moon amid a race with the Asian nation.
More rivalry between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“Additional missions means greater innovation in orbit,” an ex-agency official said. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
