Blue Origin, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated launch of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend due to unfavorable weather factors at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Reasons
Precipitation and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, then came cumulus cloud cover as the narrow time frame for launch closed, leaving mission controllers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Competition between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been intensifying in the past few months.
New Launch Window
To ease traffic in the skies during the US federal government shutdown, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs starting Monday.
After scrubbing the launch, Blue Origin announced late Sunday that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was targeting another attempt as early as midweek within a time slot of afternoon hours EST.
Mission Objectives
When it eventually launches, the 322-foot tall launch vehicle will carry the US space agency's two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, in an effort to examine the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of human exploration.
The mission will also serve as a crucial trial of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the firm if accomplished.
Previous Flight
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was considered a success, as its payload achieved orbit and completed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be reusable, did not stick its landing on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and instead was lost during descent.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission the launch provider will try once more to recover the first stage.
Thus far, only SpaceX has managed that accomplishment.
Industry Competition
The competing companies of billionaires Musk and Bezos 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, noting that SpaceX was lagging behind.
The current administration has involved the administration pile pressure on NASA to speed up its progress to launch astronauts to the lunar surface in competition against 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 orbit,” a former NASA chief technologist said. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
