The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to postpone the highly anticipated launch of its powerful launch vehicle on the weekend because of unfavorable weather factors at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Causes
Rainfall and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, followed by thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window closed, leaving managers to reschedule the rocket’s planned second mission.
Rivalry between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been intensifying in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To ease traffic in the skies amid the US federal government shutdown, the aviation regulator is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs starting Monday.
After scrubbing the mission, the company announced on Sunday evening that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was aiming for a new try as soon as Wednesday within a window of 2.50pm to 4.17pm Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will carry the US space agency's two Mars-bound probes to Mars, in an effort to study the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of sending people there.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a crucial trial of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would prove a major advancement for the firm if successful.
Previous Flight
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in the start of the year was marked as a success, as its cargo reached space and completed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be reusable, failed to make its landing on a ocean-based target in the ocean, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission Blue Origin will try once more to recover the booster stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Space Race
The competing companies of tycoons Musk and Bezos are engaged in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as the space agency opened up proposals for its lunar exploration program, complaining that one company was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has seen the administration pile pressure on NASA to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with China.
More rivalry between the two firms could “expand our options with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means greater innovation in space,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It isn't a negative to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
