The aerospace company, founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was forced to postpone the highly anticipated launch of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday because of unfavorable meteorological conditions at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Reasons
Precipitation and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, followed by thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window ended, leaving managers to reschedule the rocket’s planned second mission.
Rivalry between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To relieve traffic in the skies amid the US federal government shutdown, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting private space launches from 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 targeting a new try as early as Wednesday 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 two Mars-bound probes to Mars, to study the Martian atmospheric past with the long-term goal of sending people there.
Blue Origin’s launch will also act as a key test of whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would represent a major advancement for the company if successful.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was marked as a success, as its payload reached space and successfully performed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a platform in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during the return phase.
Recovery Efforts
For this new mission Blue Origin will try once more to recover the first stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of tycoons Bezos and Musk are locked in a private sector space competition that recently escalated, as the space agency opened up proposals for its planned moon mission, noting that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has seen the government pile pressure on the agency to accelerate its timeline to send a crewed mission to the Moon in competition against China.
More rivalry between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means greater innovation in space,” an ex-agency official stated. “It can’t be a bad thing to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”
