Blue Origin, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, had to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend because of adverse meteorological factors at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Causes
Rainfall and a ground system issue caused initial delays, then came thick clouds as the narrow time frame for launch closed, leaving mission controllers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To ease traffic in the skies amid the US federal government shutdown, the Federal Aviation Administration is limiting private space launches from Monday.
Following the cancellation of the mission, the company announced late Sunday that, in coordination with the FAA, it was targeting a new try as soon as Wednesday within a time slot of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 322-foot tall launch vehicle will carry NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, in an effort to examine the Martian atmospheric past 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 prove a major advancement for the firm if successful.
Earlier Mission
The rocket's first launch in the start of the year was marked as a success, as its payload achieved orbit and completed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the ocean, and instead was lost during descent.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort the launch provider 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 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 administration pile pressure on NASA to accelerate its progress to send a crewed mission to the lunar surface in competition against the Asian nation.
More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means more ideas in space,” an ex-agency official stated. “It isn't a bad thing to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
