Launch of First Amazon Project Kuiper Internet Satellites Is Scrubbed
The spacecraft are the online giant’s entry into beaming wireless service from space, but the company has much to do before it can compete with SpaceX’s Starlink.
The spacecraft are the online giant’s entry into beaming wireless service from space, but the company has much to do before it can compete with SpaceX’s Starlink.
The battle of billionaires in space between Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk is ready to enter a new arena: satellite internet. But the contest will have to wait another day as weather along Florida’s Space Coast on Wednesday night interfered with a launch attempt.
Amazon, the company that Mr. Bezos started as an online bookseller three decades ago, is now a merchandising behemoth, the owner of the James Bond franchise, a seller of electronic gadgets like Echo smart speakers and one of the most powerful providers of cloud computing.
So perhaps it is not a surprise that Amazon is now launching the first few of thousands of satellites known as Project Kuiper to provide another option for remaining connected in the modern world. The market for beaming high-speed internet to the ground from orbit is currently dominated by Elon Musk’s SpaceX rocket company, which operates a similar service, Starlink. Starlink, with thousands of satellites in orbit and more launching nearly every week, already serves several million customers around the world.
Why was the launch postponed?
The first 27 Project Kuiper satellites were scheduled to lift off on Wednesday between 7 and 9 p.m. Eastern time from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. They were to fly on an Atlas V, a rocket made by United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin. U.L.A.
But the flight attempt was dogged by poor weather near the launch site, with rain, wind and cloudy conditions making a liftoff unsafe. After pushing back the launch time several times during the two-hour window, U.L.A.’s flight director decided to scrub the flight around 8:41 p.m.
The company is reviewing the next opportunity for a launch.
What is Project Kuiper?
Project Kuiper will be a constellation of internet satellites intended to provide high-speed data connections to almost every point on Earth. Doing this successfully will require thousands of satellites, and Amazon’s goal is to operate more than 3,200 in the years to come.
