Blue Origin, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to postpone the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend because of unfavorable weather factors at the Florida launch site.
Mission Postponement Causes
Precipitation and a ground system issue caused initial delays, then came cumulus cloud cover as the narrow time frame for launch ended, leaving managers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in recent months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To relieve traffic in the skies during the US federal government shutdown, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting private space launches starting the beginning of the week.
After scrubbing the mission, Blue Origin announced late Sunday that, working alongside the FAA, it was targeting another attempt as soon as midweek within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm EST.
Mission Objectives
When it eventually launches, the 322-foot tall launch vehicle will carry the US space agency's Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, in an effort to study the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of human exploration.
Blue Origin’s launch will also act as a crucial trial of whether it can achieve booster recovery, which would prove a technical breakthrough for the company if accomplished.
Earlier Mission
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was marked as a achievement, as its payload reached space and successfully performed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was designed as recoverable, did not stick its landing on a platform in the ocean, and instead was lost during descent.
Recovery Efforts
In its second effort the launch provider will try once more to recover the first stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.
Space Race
Rival firms of tycoons Bezos and Musk are engaged in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as NASA opened up bids for its lunar exploration program, noting that one company was falling behind schedule.
Donald Trump’s second term has seen the administration push the agency to speed up its progress to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with China.
Increased competition between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“Additional missions means more ideas in orbit,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It isn't a negative to have Blue Origin, even trailing behind.”
