The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated launch of its powerful launch vehicle on the weekend because of adverse weather conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Reasons
Rainfall and a ground system issue caused early setbacks, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window ended, forcing mission controllers to reschedule the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been heating up in recent months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To ease traffic in the skies amid the government funding gap, the aviation regulator is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs starting the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the launch, the company announced on Sunday evening that, in coordination with the FAA, it was aiming for another attempt as soon as midweek within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm EST.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will transport NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to Mars, in an effort to study the planet’s climate history with the long-term goal of human exploration.
The mission will also serve as a crucial trial of whether it can achieve booster recovery, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the firm if successful.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was considered a achievement, as its payload reached space and successfully performed tests.
But its first-stage booster, which was designed as reusable, did not stick its landing on a ocean-based target in the ocean, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Recovery Efforts
In its second effort the launch provider will make another attempt to recover the booster stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Industry Competition
The competing companies of billionaires Musk and Bezos are engaged in a private sector space competition that has grown more intense lately, as the space agency opened up bids for its planned moon mission, complaining that one company was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has seen the administration push the agency to accelerate its progress to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with the Asian nation.
Increased competition between the two firms could “expand our options with regard to launch.”
“Additional missions means more ideas in space,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It isn't a negative to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
