The aerospace company, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, had to postpone the eagerly awaited launch of its powerful launch vehicle on the weekend due to adverse meteorological factors at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Reasons
Precipitation and a ground system issue led to initial delays, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the narrow time frame for launch closed, forcing mission controllers to push back the vehicle's upcoming flight.
Competition between Bezos' firm and Musk's space company has been heating up in the past few months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To relieve airspace congestion amid the government funding gap, the Federal Aviation Administration is limiting private space launches from Monday.
Following the cancellation of the launch, the company said on Sunday evening that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was aiming for a new try as soon as midweek within a time slot of afternoon hours EST.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to Mars, to study the planet’s climate history with the long-term goal of sending people there.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a key test of whether it can achieve booster recovery, which would represent a major advancement for the company if accomplished.
Previous Flight
The rocket's first launch in January was marked as a success, as its payload achieved orbit and successfully performed tests.
But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be recoverable, failed to make its landing on a platform in the ocean, and instead was lost during the return phase.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission Blue Origin will try once more to land the booster stage.
Until now, only SpaceX has achieved that feat.
Space Race
Rival firms of billionaires Bezos and Musk are engaged in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as NASA opened up bids for its planned moon mission, complaining that SpaceX was lagging behind.
The current administration has seen the government push the agency to accelerate its timeline to send a crewed mission to the Moon in competition against 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 orbit,” an ex-agency official said. “It can’t be a negative to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
