Blue Origin, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, had to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday due to unfavorable meteorological factors at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Reasons
Precipitation 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 Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been intensifying in recent months.
Rescheduled Attempt
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.
After scrubbing the launch, Blue Origin announced late Sunday that, working alongside the FAA, it was targeting a new try 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 carry the US space agency's two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, in an effort to examine the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of sending people there.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a key test of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the firm if successful.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in the start of the year was considered a success, as its payload achieved orbit and successfully performed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was designed as reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a platform in the ocean, and instead was lost during the return phase.
Recovery Efforts
In its second effort Blue Origin will try once more to land the first stage.
Thus far, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.
Space Race
The competing companies of tycoons Bezos and Musk are engaged in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as the space agency began accepting proposals for its planned moon mission, complaining that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
Donald Trump’s second term has involved the government push the agency to speed up its progress to send a crewed mission to the lunar surface in competition against China.
Increased competition between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“More launches means greater innovation in orbit,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It isn't a bad thing to have Blue Origin, even trailing behind.”
