The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the eagerly awaited launch of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday because of adverse meteorological conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Causes
Precipitation and a ground system issue caused initial delays, then came cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window ended, forcing managers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been intensifying in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To relieve traffic in the skies during the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the launch, the company said on Sunday evening that, in coordination with the regulatory body, it was targeting another attempt as early as Wednesday within a time slot of afternoon hours EST.
Launch Goals
When it eventually launches, the 322-foot tall launch vehicle will carry the US space agency's two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, to examine the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of human exploration.
Blue Origin’s launch will also act as a crucial trial of whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would prove a major advancement for the company if accomplished.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was marked as a achievement, as its cargo achieved orbit and completed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be recoverable, failed to make its landing on a platform in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during the return phase.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort Blue Origin will try once more to land the first stage.
Thus far, only SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Space Race
The competing companies of tycoons Bezos and Musk are engaged in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as NASA began accepting bids for its planned moon mission, complaining that SpaceX was lagging behind.
The current administration has seen the government push the agency to accelerate its timeline to launch astronauts to the lunar surface in competition against the Asian nation.
More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“More launches means greater innovation in space,” an ex-agency official said. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
