Blue Origin Scrubs Second New Glenn Launch, Will Try Again November 12

Jeff Bezos’ abstraction institution Blue Origin scrubbed nan 2nd motorboat of its New Glenn mega-rocket planned for Sunday day owed to concerns pinch weather, a fewer insignificant problems pinch motorboat pad equipment, and astatine slightest 1 cruise vessel that strayed excessively adjacent to nan formation path.

The institution said precocious Sunday that it will return different spell astatine launching New Glenn’s 2nd ngo connected Wednesday, November 12. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) announced restrictions connected abstraction launches precocious past week owed to nan authorities shutdown, and Blue Origin said successful a station connected X Sunday that it worked pinch nan FAA to make nan 2nd effort happen. The motorboat windo opens astatine 2:50 p.m. ET and lasts until 4:17 p.m. ET.

This ngo is an important 1 for Blue Origin for a number of reasons.

For one, nan institution is still proving retired nan afloat reusability of nan rocket. New Glenn successfully reached orbit during its first motorboat successful January, but nan booster exploded earlier it could onshore connected a drone vessel successful nan ocean. Blue Origin hopes to onshore nan booster for nan first clip during this 2nd flight.

This is besides nan first commercialized ngo for New Glenn. The rocket will transportation NASA’s ESCAPADE spacecraft into space, wherever it will embark connected a ngo to Mars. New Glenn is besides carrying a tech demonstrator for Viasat, which is portion of different NASA project. Proving New Glenn tin safely present payloads to abstraction — and do it costs efficaciously acknowledgment successful ample portion to nan rockets reusability — is important if Blue Origin wants to compete against Elon Musk’s SpaceX.

Blue Origin primitively planned to effort nan 2nd motorboat earlier this year, but delayed it respective times. Sunday’s motorboat model successful Cape Canaveral, Florida initially opened astatine 2:45 p.m. ET, and nan institution had a model of astir 90 minutes. The upwind worries and nan motorboat pad instrumentality issues caused that motorboat clip to gaffe a fewer times.

With nan timepiece moving again conscionable minutes earlier a motorboat attempt, a cruise vessel entered nan formation path, according to nan broadcast. While that vessel was expected to clear earlier nan 4:15 p.m. ET adjacent of nan motorboat window, nan upwind was still a concern, and caused nan institution to scrub nan attempt.