The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, had to delay the highly anticipated launch of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend because of adverse meteorological conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Reasons
Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground caused early setbacks, followed by thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window ended, leaving mission controllers to reschedule the rocket’s planned second mission.
Competition between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been heating up in recent months.
New Launch Window
To relieve traffic in the skies during the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the mission, Blue Origin said late Sunday that, in coordination with the FAA, it was targeting a new try as early as midweek within a time slot of afternoon hours EST.
Mission Objectives
When it eventually launches, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will carry NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, in an effort to study the planet’s climate history with the long-term goal of human exploration.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a crucial trial of whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would prove a major advancement for the company if accomplished.
Previous Flight
The rocket's first launch in the start of the year was marked as a achievement, as its payload reached space and successfully performed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a platform in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during the return phase.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission Blue Origin will try once more to land the first stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.
Industry Competition
The competing companies of billionaires Musk and Bezos are locked in a private sector space competition that has grown more intense lately, as NASA opened up proposals for its planned moon mission, noting that one company was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has seen the government push the agency to speed up its progress to send a crewed mission to the lunar surface in competition against China.
More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”
“Additional missions means greater innovation in orbit,” an ex-agency official said. “It isn't a negative to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”
