The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, had to postpone the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend because of unfavorable meteorological factors at the Florida launch site.
Mission Postponement Causes
Precipitation and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, followed by thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window closed, forcing mission controllers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been intensifying in recent months.
New Launch Window
To ease airspace congestion during the government funding gap, the aviation regulator is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs from the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the mission, Blue Origin announced on Sunday evening that, working alongside the FAA, it was targeting a new try as soon as Wednesday within a window of afternoon hours EST.
Launch Goals
When it eventually launches, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will transport the US space agency's two Mars-bound probes to Mars, in an effort to examine the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of human exploration.
The mission will also serve as a key test of whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the company if successful.
Previous Flight
The rocket's first launch in January was marked as a achievement, as its payload reached space and successfully performed tests.
But its main rocket section, which was designed as reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a platform in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort the launch provider will try once more to recover the first stage.
Thus far, only Musk’s company SpaceX has managed that accomplishment.
Space Race
The competing companies of billionaires Musk and Bezos are engaged in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as the space agency opened up bids for its planned moon mission, complaining that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
Donald Trump’s second term has involved the government push the agency to accelerate its timeline to send a crewed mission to the lunar surface in competition against the Asian nation.
More rivalry between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“Additional missions means greater innovation in space,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It isn't a bad thing to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
