The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, had to delay the highly anticipated launch of its powerful launch vehicle on the weekend due to unfavorable weather conditions at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Reasons
Precipitation and a technical problem on the ground caused early setbacks, then came cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window closed, leaving managers to reschedule the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been intensifying in recent months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To ease airspace congestion amid the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is limiting private space launches starting Monday.
After scrubbing the launch, the company said on Sunday evening that, in coordination with the FAA, it was targeting another attempt as early as Wednesday within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm EST.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to Mars, in an effort to examine the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of sending people there.
Blue Origin’s launch will also act as a key test of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the company if successful.
Previous Flight
New Glenn’s inaugural flight in the start of the year was marked as a achievement, as its payload achieved orbit and successfully performed experiments.
But its first-stage booster, which was designed as recoverable, did not stick its landing on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and instead was lost during descent.
Landing Attempts
In its second effort Blue Origin will make another attempt to recover the booster stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Industry Competition
The competing companies of tycoons Bezos and Musk are locked in a private sector space competition that recently escalated, as the space agency began accepting proposals for its lunar exploration program, complaining that SpaceX was lagging behind.
Donald Trump’s second term has seen the administration pile pressure on NASA to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with China.
More rivalry between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“More launches means greater innovation in space,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It isn't a negative to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”
