Blue Origin, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, had to postpone the highly anticipated liftoff of its powerful launch vehicle on the weekend because of adverse weather conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Causes
Precipitation and a technical problem on the ground caused early setbacks, then came thick clouds as the narrow time frame for launch ended, leaving mission controllers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in recent 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.
After scrubbing the launch, the company said late Sunday that, working alongside the FAA, it was targeting another attempt as early as Wednesday within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm EST.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will carry the US space agency's Escapade twin spacecraft to Mars, in an effort to study the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of human exploration.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a key test of whether it can achieve booster recovery, which would prove a major advancement for the firm if successful.
Earlier Mission
The rocket's first launch in the start of the year was marked as a achievement, as its cargo achieved orbit and completed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was designed as reusable, did not stick its landing on a platform in the ocean, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Recovery Efforts
In its second effort the launch provider will try once more to recover the booster stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has managed that accomplishment.
Space Race
The competing companies of tycoons Bezos and Musk are locked in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as NASA opened up proposals for its planned moon mission, complaining that one company was lagging behind.
Donald Trump’s second term has seen the administration pile pressure on NASA to accelerate its timeline to send a crewed mission to the lunar surface amid a race with the Asian nation.
More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means more ideas in space,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It can’t be a negative to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”
