Blue Origin, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was forced to postpone the eagerly awaited liftoff of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday because of adverse weather conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Reasons
Rainfall and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window closed, forcing mission controllers to reschedule the rocket’s planned second mission.
Competition between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in recent months.
New Launch Window
To ease traffic in the skies during the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs from Monday.
Following the cancellation of the launch, the company said late Sunday that, in coordination with the regulatory body, it was aiming for another attempt as soon as midweek within a window of 2.50pm to 4.17pm Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter New Glenn rocket will carry NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, to study the planet’s climate history with the long-term goal of human exploration.
The mission will also act as a crucial trial of whether it can achieve booster recovery, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the company if successful.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was considered a achievement, as its payload achieved orbit and completed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be reusable, did not stick its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Recovery Efforts
For this new mission the launch provider will make another attempt to land the first stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of tycoons Musk and Bezos are locked in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as the space agency began accepting proposals for its planned moon mission, complaining that SpaceX was lagging behind.
The current administration has seen the government pile pressure on the agency to speed up its progress to send a crewed mission to the Moon amid a race with the Asian nation.
More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“More launches means more ideas in space,” a former NASA chief technologist said. “It can’t be a negative to have Blue Origin, even trailing behind.”
