The aerospace company, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend because of unfavorable weather conditions at Cape Canaveral.
Launch Delay Reasons
Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground caused early setbacks, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the narrow time frame for launch closed, leaving managers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.
Competition between Bezos' firm and Musk's space company has been intensifying in recent months.
New Launch Window
To relieve traffic in the skies amid the government funding gap, the aviation regulator is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs from Monday.
After scrubbing the mission, the company said on Sunday evening that, in coordination with the regulatory body, it was aiming for another attempt as early as midweek within a window of afternoon hours EST.
Launch Goals
Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will transport NASA’s Escapade twin spacecraft to the Red Planet, to examine the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of human exploration.
The mission will also act as a crucial trial of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would represent 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 achievement, as its cargo achieved orbit 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 ended up destroyed during the return phase.
Recovery Efforts
In its second effort the launch provider will try once more to land the booster stage.
Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.
Space Race
The competing companies of tycoons Musk and Bezos are locked in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as the space agency began accepting bids for its planned moon mission, complaining that SpaceX was falling behind schedule.
The current administration has seen the government push the agency to speed up its progress to send a crewed mission to the Moon amid a race with the Asian nation.
Increased competition between the two firms could “expand our options with regard to launch.”
“Additional missions means more ideas in orbit,” an ex-agency official stated. “It can’t be a negative to have the competitor, even not in the lead.”
