Blue Origin, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, had to postpone the highly anticipated liftoff of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday because of unfavorable weather factors at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Reasons
Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground caused early setbacks, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window closed, leaving mission controllers to reschedule the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in the past few months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To relieve traffic in the skies amid the government funding gap, the aviation regulator is restricting private space launches from the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the mission, Blue Origin announced on Sunday evening that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was targeting a new try as soon as midweek within a time slot of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter New Glenn rocket will carry NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to Mars, in an effort to study the planet’s climate history with the long-term goal of human exploration.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a crucial trial of whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would prove a major advancement for the firm if accomplished.
Earlier Mission
The rocket's first launch in January was marked as a achievement, as its payload achieved orbit and successfully performed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was designed as reusable, did not stick its landing on a ocean-based target in the ocean, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Recovery Efforts
For this new mission Blue Origin will make another attempt to recover the booster stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Industry Competition
The competing companies of billionaires Bezos and Musk are locked in a private sector space competition that has grown more intense lately, as the space agency opened up proposals for its lunar exploration program, complaining that one company was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has involved the government push the agency to accelerate its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with China.
More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“Additional missions means more ideas in space,” an ex-agency official said. “It can’t be a negative to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
