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The aerospace company, owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos, was forced to delay the highly anticipated liftoff of its New Glenn rocket on Sunday because of unfavorable meteorological conditions at the Florida launch site.

Launch Delay Reasons

Rainfall and a ground system issue led to initial delays, then came thick clouds as the narrow time frame for launch ended, leaving managers to push back the rocket’s planned second mission.

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

New Launch Window

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

Following the cancellation of the launch, the company said late Sunday that, working alongside the regulatory body, it was targeting a new try as early as Wednesday within a time slot of afternoon hours Eastern Standard time.

Mission Objectives

Upon successful liftoff, the 98-meter tall launch vehicle will carry the US space agency's two Mars-bound probes to Mars, in an effort to study the Martian atmospheric past with the eventual hope of human exploration.

The mission will also serve as a key test of whether it can achieve booster recovery, which would represent a technical breakthrough for the company if successful.

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 first-stage booster, which was meant to be recoverable, did not stick its landing on a platform in the ocean, and ended up destroyed during the return phase.

Landing Attempts

In its second effort the launch provider will make another attempt to land the booster stage.

Thus far, only SpaceX has achieved that feat.

Industry Competition

Rival firms of tycoons Bezos and Musk are engaged in a private sector space competition that has grown more intense lately, as NASA began accepting bids for its planned moon mission, complaining that one company was falling behind schedule.

The current administration has involved the government pile pressure on the agency to speed up its timeline to send a crewed mission to the Moon in competition against the Asian nation.

More rivalry between SpaceX and Blue Origin could “give us more choices with regard to launch.”

“Additional missions means more ideas in orbit,” an ex-agency official said. “It isn't a bad thing to have Blue Origin, even not in the lead.”