Blue Origin, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated launch of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday due to unfavorable meteorological factors at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Reasons
Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground caused initial delays, followed by thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window ended, leaving mission controllers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Competition between Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been intensifying in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To relieve airspace congestion amid the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from Monday.
After scrubbing the mission, Blue Origin said on Sunday evening that, in coordination with the FAA, it was aiming for a new try as early as Wednesday within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
When it eventually launches, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will carry the US space agency's Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, in an effort to study the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of sending people there.
Blue Origin’s launch will also act as a crucial trial of its ability to perform 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 achieved orbit and successfully performed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was designed as reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a platform in the Atlantic, and instead was lost during descent.
Recovery Efforts
For this new mission Blue Origin will make another attempt to recover the booster stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has managed that accomplishment.
Space Race
The competing companies of tycoons 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, noting that one company was lagging behind.
The current administration has seen the government push NASA to speed up its progress to send a crewed mission to the Moon in competition against the Asian nation.
Increased competition between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“Additional missions means more ideas in space,” a former NASA chief technologist said. “It isn't a bad thing to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”
