The aerospace company, founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, had to delay the eagerly awaited liftoff of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday due to adverse meteorological factors at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Causes
Precipitation and a technical problem on the ground caused early setbacks, followed by thick clouds as the 88-minute launch window closed, leaving managers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.
Rivalry between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in the past few months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To ease airspace congestion during the US federal government shutdown, the aviation regulator is restricting private space launches starting the beginning of the week.
Following the cancellation of the launch, Blue Origin announced on Sunday evening that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was targeting another attempt as early as midweek within a window of 2.50pm to 4.17pm Eastern Standard time.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will transport NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to Mars, in an effort to study the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of sending people there.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a crucial trial of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would prove a technical breakthrough for the company if successful.
Previous Flight
The rocket's first launch in the start of the year was marked as a success, as its payload reached space and successfully performed tests.
But its main rocket section, which was meant to be recoverable, failed to make its landing on a ocean-based target in the ocean, and instead was lost during the return phase.
Landing Attempts
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
Rival firms of tycoons Musk and Bezos are locked in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as NASA opened up bids for its lunar exploration program, complaining that SpaceX was lagging behind.
The current administration has involved the government pile pressure on NASA to speed up its progress 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 greater innovation in space,” an ex-agency official stated. “It can’t be a bad thing to have Blue Origin, even trailing behind.”
