Blue Origin, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to postpone the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend due to adverse weather conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Causes
Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground caused initial delays, then came thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window ended, leaving managers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in the past few months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To ease traffic in the skies during the government funding gap, the aviation regulator is limiting private space launches starting the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the mission, the company announced late Sunday that, in coordination with the regulatory body, it was aiming for a new try as soon as Wednesday within a time slot of afternoon hours EST.
Launch Goals
When it eventually launches, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry the US space agency's Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, in an effort to study the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of sending people there.
The mission will also act as a key test of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would prove a technical breakthrough for the firm if accomplished.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in the start of the year was marked as a success, as its cargo reached space and successfully performed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be recoverable, did not stick its landing on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Recovery Efforts
For this new mission Blue Origin will try once more to recover the first stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of tycoons Bezos and Musk are engaged in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as the space agency opened up bids for its planned moon mission, complaining that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
Donald Trump’s second term has involved the government pile pressure on the agency to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts to the lunar surface in competition against the Asian nation.
Increased competition 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 can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
