Blue Origin, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, had to delay the eagerly awaited liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend due to adverse weather factors at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Reasons
Precipitation and a technical problem on the ground caused initial delays, then came cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window ended, leaving mission controllers to reschedule the rocket’s planned second mission.
Competition between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been intensifying in the past few months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To ease traffic in the skies amid the US federal government shutdown, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs starting the beginning of the week.
After scrubbing the mission, Blue Origin announced late Sunday that, in coordination with the regulatory body, it was targeting a new try as soon as midweek within a time slot of afternoon hours EST.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter New Glenn rocket will transport 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.
The mission will also serve as a crucial trial of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the firm if successful.
Previous Flight
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in the start of the year was marked as a success, as its cargo reached space and completed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be reusable, did not stick its landing on a platform in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort Blue Origin will try once more to recover the booster stage.
Thus far, only SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of tycoons Musk and Bezos are locked in a private sector space competition that recently escalated, as NASA began accepting proposals for its lunar exploration program, noting that one company was lagging behind.
Donald Trump’s second term has involved the administration push the agency to speed up its progress to launch astronauts to the lunar surface in competition against the Asian nation.
Increased competition between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “expand our options with regard to liftoff.”
“More launches means more ideas in space,” an ex-agency official stated. “It isn't a bad thing to have Blue Origin, even trailing behind.”
