The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the eagerly awaited launch of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend because of unfavorable weather conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Causes
Precipitation and a ground system issue caused initial delays, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window ended, leaving managers to push back 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 airspace congestion amid the US federal government shutdown, the aviation regulator is limiting private space launches from Monday.
After scrubbing the mission, the company announced on Sunday evening that, in coordination with the regulatory body, it was targeting a new try as soon as Wednesday within a window of 2.50pm to 4.17pm Eastern Standard time.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry the US space agency's two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, in an effort to study the Martian atmospheric past with the long-term goal of human exploration.
Blue Origin’s launch will also act as a crucial trial of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would represent a major advancement for the firm if successful.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in the start of the year was marked as a success, as its payload achieved orbit and successfully performed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a platform in the Atlantic, 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 SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of tycoons Bezos and Musk are engaged in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as NASA began accepting proposals for its planned moon mission, complaining that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
Donald Trump’s second term has seen the government pile pressure on NASA to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon in competition against China.
More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means greater innovation in orbit,” an ex-agency official said. “It isn't a bad thing to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”