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Blue Origin, owned by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the eagerly awaited launch of its powerful launch vehicle on Sunday due to unfavorable meteorological factors at the Florida launch site.

Launch Delay Reasons

Precipitation and a technical problem on the ground led to early setbacks, then came thick clouds as the narrow time frame for launch closed, forcing managers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.

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

New Launch Window

To relieve airspace congestion amid the government funding gap, the aviation regulator is restricting commercial rocket liftoffs starting the beginning of the week.

Following the cancellation of the mission, the company announced on Sunday evening that, working alongside the FAA, it was targeting another attempt as soon as midweek within a time slot of afternoon hours EST.

Mission Objectives

Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, in an effort to examine the planet’s climate history with the eventual hope of sending people there.

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

Earlier Mission

The rocket's first launch in the start of the year was considered a success, as its payload reached space and successfully performed experiments.

But its first-stage booster, which was meant to be recoverable, did not stick its touchdown on a ocean-based target in the Atlantic, and instead was lost during the return phase.

Recovery Efforts

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

Until now, only Musk’s company SpaceX has achieved that feat.

Industry Competition

The competing companies of tycoons Bezos and Musk are locked in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as the space agency opened up proposals for its lunar exploration program, complaining that SpaceX was lagging behind.

Donald Trump’s second term has seen the government push the agency to speed up its timeline to send a crewed mission to the lunar surface amid a race with China.

Increased competition between the two firms could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”

“More launches means greater innovation in space,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It isn't a negative to have Blue Origin, even trailing behind.”