Blue Origin, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the eagerly awaited launch of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday due to adverse meteorological factors at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Reasons
Precipitation and a ground system issue led to early setbacks, followed by thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window closed, forcing mission controllers to reschedule the rocket’s planned second mission.
Competition between Blue Origin 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 government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is limiting private space launches from the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the mission, Blue Origin announced late Sunday that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was targeting a new try as soon as midweek within a time slot of afternoon hours EST.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, to study the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of sending people there.
The mission will also act as a crucial trial of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would represent a major advancement for the firm if successful.
Earlier Mission
The rocket's first launch in January was marked as a achievement, as its payload reached space and successfully performed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was designed as reusable, did not stick its landing on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and instead was lost during descent.
Recovery Efforts
For this new mission Blue Origin will make another attempt to land the first stage.
Thus far, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Space Race
Rival firms of billionaires Bezos and Musk are locked in a private sector space competition that recently escalated, as NASA opened up bids for its planned moon mission, noting that one company was lagging behind.
The current administration has involved the administration push NASA to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with China.
Increased competition between the two firms could “expand our options with regard to launch.”
“More launches means greater innovation in space,” an ex-agency official stated. “It can’t be a negative to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
