The aerospace company, founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday due to adverse meteorological conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Mission Postponement Causes
Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground led to early setbacks, then came thick clouds 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 intensifying in recent months.
Rescheduled Attempt
To relieve traffic in the skies during the US federal government shutdown, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs from the beginning of the week.
After scrubbing the mission, the company announced on Sunday evening that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was targeting another attempt as early as Wednesday within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm Eastern Standard time.
Mission Objectives
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry the US space agency's two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, to study the Martian atmospheric past with the long-term goal of human exploration.
Blue Origin’s launch will also serve as a key test of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would represent a major advancement for the company if successful.
Earlier Mission
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 first-stage booster, which was designed as recoverable, failed to make its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and ended up destroyed during descent.
Landing Attempts
For this new mission the launch provider will try once more to recover the booster stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.
Industry Competition
Rival firms of billionaires Bezos and Musk are engaged in a private sector space competition that has grown more intense lately, as NASA began accepting bids for its lunar exploration program, noting that SpaceX was lagging behind.
Donald Trump’s second term has seen the government push NASA to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with China.
Increased competition between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”
“More launches means more ideas in orbit,” a former NASA chief technologist said. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”
