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Blue Origin, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, had to postpone the eagerly awaited liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on the weekend due to adverse meteorological conditions at the Florida launch site.

Mission Postponement Causes

Rainfall and a ground system issue led to initial delays, then came cumulus cloud cover as the narrow time frame for launch closed, forcing managers to reschedule the vehicle's upcoming flight.

Rivalry between Bezos' firm and Elon Musk’s SpaceX has been intensifying in recent months.

New Launch Window

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

After scrubbing the launch, the company said late Sunday that, in coordination with the FAA, it was targeting another attempt as early as Wednesday within a time slot of afternoon hours EST.

Mission Objectives

When it eventually launches, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry NASA’s two Mars-bound probes to the Red Planet, in an effort to study the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of sending people there.

Blue Origin’s launch will also act as a key test of its ability to perform reusable rocket landing, which would prove a technical breakthrough for the firm if accomplished.

Previous Flight

New Glenn’s inaugural flight in January was considered a achievement, as its cargo achieved orbit and successfully performed experiments.

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

Landing Attempts

In its second effort Blue Origin will try once more to land the booster stage.

Thus far, only SpaceX has achieved that accomplishment.

Space Race

Rival firms of tycoons Bezos and Musk are locked in a commercial space race that recently escalated, as the space agency began accepting proposals for its lunar exploration program, complaining that one company was falling behind schedule.

Donald Trump’s second term has involved the administration push the agency to accelerate its progress to send a crewed mission to the lunar surface amid a race with the Asian nation.

Increased competition between the two firms could “expand our options with regard to liftoff.”

“Additional missions means greater innovation in space,” a former NASA chief technologist stated. “It can’t be a bad thing to have the competitor, even trailing behind.”