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Blue Origin, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, had to delay the eagerly awaited launch of its powerful launch vehicle on the weekend because of adverse weather factors at Cape Canaveral.

Launch Delay Causes

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 Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been heating up in the past few months.

Rescheduled Attempt

To ease airspace congestion amid the US federal government shutdown, the Federal Aviation Administration is restricting private space launches from Monday.

After scrubbing the mission, the company said on Sunday evening that, in coordination with the FAA, it was aiming for a new try as early as midweek within a window of afternoon hours EST.

Mission Objectives

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 human exploration.

The mission will also act as a crucial trial of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would represent a major advancement for the firm if accomplished.

Earlier Mission

The rocket's first launch in January was marked as a achievement, as its payload reached space and successfully performed experiments.

But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be recoverable, failed to make its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the ocean, and instead was lost during descent.

Recovery Efforts

For this new mission the launch provider will make another attempt to recover the booster stage.

Thus far, only SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.

Industry Competition

The competing companies of billionaires Musk and Bezos are locked in a commercial space race that has grown more intense lately, as NASA began accepting proposals for its planned moon mission, complaining that one company was lagging behind.

The current administration has involved the government pile pressure on NASA to speed up its timeline to launch astronauts to the Moon amid a race with China.

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

“Additional missions means greater innovation in orbit,” an ex-agency official stated. “It can’t be a negative to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”