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The aerospace company, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, had to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend due to unfavorable weather factors at Cape Canaveral.

Mission Postponement Reasons

Rainfall and a technical problem on the ground led to early setbacks, followed by thick clouds as the narrow time frame for launch closed, leaving mission controllers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.

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

New Launch Window

To ease traffic in the skies during the US federal government shutdown, the aviation regulator is limiting commercial rocket liftoffs starting the beginning of the week.

After scrubbing the mission, the company announced late Sunday that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was aiming for another attempt as soon as Wednesday within a time slot of 2.50pm to 4.17pm Eastern Standard time.

Launch Goals

When it eventually launches, the 322-foot New Glenn rocket will transport the US space agency's two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, to study the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of human exploration.

The mission will also act as a key test of its ability to perform booster recovery, which would prove a major advancement for the company if accomplished.

Earlier Mission

New Glenn’s inaugural flight in the start of the year was marked as a achievement, as its payload reached space and successfully performed experiments.

But its main rocket section, which was designed as recoverable, failed to make its landing on a platform in the ocean, and ended up destroyed during descent.

Landing Attempts

For this new mission Blue Origin will try once more to recover the first stage.

Thus far, only SpaceX has achieved that feat.

Industry Competition

Rival firms of tycoons Musk and Bezos are engaged in a private sector space competition that has grown more intense lately, as NASA opened up proposals for its planned moon mission, noting that one company was lagging behind.

The current administration has involved the government pile pressure on NASA to accelerate its timeline to launch astronauts to the lunar surface in competition against China.

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 said. “It can’t be a negative to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”