Blue Origin, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the eagerly awaited liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend because of adverse meteorological factors at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Reasons
Rainfall and a ground system issue caused early setbacks, then came cumulus cloud cover as the narrow time frame for launch ended, leaving managers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.
Competition between Bezos' firm and Musk's space company has been heating up in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To relieve airspace congestion amid the government funding gap, the aviation regulator is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs starting Monday.
After scrubbing the mission, the company said late Sunday that, in coordination with the FAA, it was aiming for a new try as early as Wednesday within a window of afternoon hours EST.
Launch Goals
When it eventually launches, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will carry NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, to examine 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 whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would prove a technical breakthrough for the company if successful.
Earlier Mission
The rocket's first launch in the start of the year was marked as a success, as its cargo reached space and successfully performed tests.
But its main rocket section, which was designed as recoverable, failed to make its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during the return phase.
Recovery Efforts
For this new mission the launch provider will make another attempt to land the booster stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Space Race
Rival firms of billionaires Musk and Bezos are engaged in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as NASA began accepting proposals for its lunar exploration program, complaining that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has involved the government pile pressure on the agency to speed up its timeline to send a crewed mission to the Moon amid a race with China.
Increased competition between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means greater innovation in orbit,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It isn't a negative to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
