The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, had to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend because of unfavorable weather factors at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Reasons
Rainfall and a ground system issue caused initial delays, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window closed, leaving managers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been intensifying in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To ease airspace congestion amid the US federal government shutdown, the aviation regulator is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs starting Monday.
Following the cancellation of the mission, the company said late Sunday that, in coordination with the FAA, it was targeting a new try as early as Wednesday within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm EST.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter New Glenn rocket will carry NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, in an effort to examine the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of human exploration.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a key test of whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would prove a technical breakthrough for the company if successful.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was marked as a success, as its cargo reached space and completed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was designed as reusable, did not stick its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort Blue Origin will try once more to land the booster stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Space Race
The competing companies of tycoons Musk and Bezos are engaged in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as the space agency began accepting proposals for its lunar exploration program, noting that SpaceX was lagging behind.
The current administration has seen the government push NASA to speed up its timeline to send a crewed mission to the Moon in competition against the Asian nation.
More rivalry between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“More launches means more ideas in space,” an ex-agency official stated. “It isn't a negative to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”
