The aerospace company, founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the eagerly awaited launch of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday due to unfavorable weather conditions at the Florida launch site.
Launch Delay Causes
Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground caused initial delays, then came thick clouds as the narrow time frame for launch closed, leaving managers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Rivalry between Blue Origin and Musk's space company has been heating up in the past few months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To ease traffic in the skies amid the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from the beginning of the week.
After scrubbing the launch, the company said on Sunday evening that, working alongside the FAA, it was targeting another attempt as early as Wednesday within a time slot of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 322-foot tall launch vehicle will transport NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, in an effort to examine the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of sending people there.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a key test of whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would prove a technical breakthrough for the company if accomplished.
Previous Flight
The rocket's first launch in the start of the year was considered a success, as its cargo reached space and completed experiments.
But its main rocket section, which was designed as reusable, failed to make its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the ocean, and instead was lost during the return phase.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission 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
The competing companies of billionaires Musk and Bezos are locked in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as NASA opened up proposals for its planned moon mission, noting that SpaceX was lagging behind.
The current administration has involved the administration pile pressure on the agency to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts 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 launch.”
“More launches means more ideas in space,” an ex-agency official said. “It can’t be a negative to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
