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Blue Origin, founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the eagerly awaited liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend due to unfavorable meteorological factors at the Florida launch site.

Launch Delay Causes

Precipitation and a technical problem on the ground led to early setbacks, followed by cumulus cloud cover as the 88-minute launch window closed, leaving mission controllers to reschedule the vehicle's upcoming flight.

Rivalry between Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been intensifying in recent months.

Rescheduled Attempt

To ease airspace congestion amid the US federal government shutdown, the aviation regulator is limiting private space launches starting the beginning of the week.

After scrubbing the mission, the company said late Sunday that, working alongside the FAA, it was targeting another attempt as soon as Wednesday within a window of 2.50pm to 4.17pm Eastern Standard time.

Launch Goals

Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, to examine the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of sending people there.

Blue Origin’s launch will also act as a crucial trial of whether it can achieve reusable rocket landing, which would prove a major advancement for the firm if successful.

Earlier Mission

The rocket's first launch in January was considered a success, as its cargo achieved orbit and successfully performed experiments.

But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be recoverable, did not stick its landing on a ocean-based target in the ocean, and ended up destroyed during descent.

Recovery Efforts

For this new mission Blue Origin will try once more to land the booster stage.

Until now, only SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.

Industry Competition

The competing companies of billionaires Musk and Bezos are engaged in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as NASA began accepting bids for its lunar exploration program, complaining that one company was falling behind schedule.

The current administration has seen the administration push the agency to accelerate its progress to send a crewed mission to the Moon in competition against the Asian nation.

More rivalry between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to liftoff.”

“More launches means greater innovation in space,” an ex-agency official stated. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”