The aerospace company, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, had to postpone the eagerly awaited liftoff of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday due to unfavorable weather conditions at the Florida launch site.
Mission Postponement Reasons
Rainfall and a ground system issue led to initial delays, then came thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window ended, leaving managers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.
Competition between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been intensifying in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To relieve airspace congestion during the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs starting the beginning of the week.
After scrubbing the mission, Blue Origin announced on Sunday evening that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was targeting another attempt as soon as midweek within a window of 2.50pm to 4.17pm EST.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will transport NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, in an effort to study the Martian atmospheric past with the long-term goal of sending people there.
The mission will also act as a key test of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would represent 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 payload achieved orbit and completed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be recoverable, did not stick its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the ocean, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Recovery Efforts
In its second effort Blue Origin will make another attempt to recover the first stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has managed that accomplishment.
Space Race
The competing companies of tycoons Musk and Bezos are engaged in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as the space agency began accepting bids for its lunar exploration program, complaining that SpaceX was lagging behind.
Donald Trump’s second term has seen the government push NASA to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with China.
More rivalry between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“Additional missions means more ideas in space,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
