Thanks for following us this morning as we wrap up our live coverage into the Blue Origin launch.

It was hoped the New Glenn rocket would be fired off into the Earth's orbit at around 1:30am ET (6:30am UK time) this morning but technical issues resulted in a series of delays until the launch was abandoned shortly before 3.30am ET (8:30am).

We will be back for the next launch when hopefully we'll have lift-off but for now farewell.

Ariane Cornell, a Blue Origin executive, has said lift-off was stood down to 'troubleshoot a vehicle subsystem issue' that went beyond the three-hour launch window.

She added: 'We are reviewing opportunities for our next launch attempt.'

Bezos, who celebrated his 61st birthday on Sunday, watched events unfold from the nearby launch control room.

The billionaire Amazon founder had hoped to take aim at the only man in the world wealthier than him, Elon Musk, whose company SpaceX dominates the orbital launch market through its prolific Falcon 9 rockets, vital for the commercial sector, the Pentagon and NASA.

Musk, for his part, wished Blue Origin "Good luck!" on X.

by Associated Press reporters

Blue Origin called off the debut launch of its massive new rocket early Monday because of technical trouble.

The 320-foot (98-meter) New Glenn rocket was supposed to blast off before dawn with a prototype satellite from Florida's Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

But launch controllers had to deal with an unspecified rocket issue in the final minutes of the countdown and ran out of time.

Once the countdown clock was halted, they immediately began draining all the fuel from the rocket.

Blue Origin did not immediately set a new launch date, saying the team needed more time to resolve the problem.

The test flight already had been delayed by rough seas that posed a risk to the company's plan to land the first-stage booster on a floating platform in the Atlantic.

New Glenn is named after the first American to orbit Earth, John Glenn. It is five times taller than Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket that carries paying customers to the edge of space from Texas.

Amazon's Jeff Bezos founded the company 25 years ago.

He took part in Monday's countdown from Mission Control, located at the rocket factory just outside the gates of NASA's Kennedy Space Center about 50 miles (80 kilometers) east of Orlando, Florida.

No matter what happens, Bezos said Sunday evening, 'we're going to pick ourselves up and keep going.'

The Blue Origin livestream, which we were hoping to bring you, has now been stood down.

Before it switched off, a company spokeswoman said the mission had been postponed to allow the team more time to work on the issues affecting today's launch.

The precise reason as to why the New Glenn was unable to lift-off was not disclosed, although we heard earlier engineers were examining a 'few anomalies'.

The mission team said they will now 'detank' the vehicle and reassess the launch before deciding when the next attempt will be.

The spokeswoman added:

When we know when the next opportunity is of course we will let everybody know.

Blue Origin has now officially called off the launch after a series of delays.

On a livestream, the company said it would work out a new date for lift-off.

The host said: 'We can't wait to get right back here for our next launch attempt'.

We've heard from the Blue Origin team on the repeated delays as the company insist they want to give the launch team the 'right time and space they need'.

Blue Origin said:

For the moment we have decided to put more time on the clock which means that we still have a chance, still have the opportunity to launch this evening

We have spent years designing this rocket, we have spent months and months designing this mission... if we need a couple more minutes especially on this first launch, that is a-OK.

Previous launches have been abandoned due to conditions at sea but we don't believe the weather is the reason behind the delays this morning.

Doubts are beginning to emerge whether a launch will take place in Florida this morning after the New Glenn lift-off was hit by repeated delays.

But while there's still a chance of some action at Cape Canaveral, let's outline five key things about this mission:

• Jeff Bezos' space project Blue Origin is preparing the maiden voyage of its New Glenn rocket, which has been in development for 10 years and a major focal point for the company
• A successful launch will give Bezos huge momentum in the ongoing space race with Elon Musk as the billionaires try and steal a march on the commercial space market.
• New Glenn is more than twice as powerful as SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket and has dozens of customer launch contracts collectively worth billions of dollars lined up.
• Like SpaceX's Falcon rockets, the booster part of New Glenn is partially reusable. The mission, the culmination of a decade-long, multi-billion-dollar development journey, will include an attempt to land New Glenn's first stage booster on a sea-fairing barge in the Atlantic Ocean 10 minutes after liftoff, while the rocket's second stage continues toward orbit.
• In a pre-launch meeting, the Amazon founder told Reuters: 'The thing we're most nervous about is the booster landing. Clearly on a first flight you could have an anomaly at any mission phase, so anything could happen'.

Why is this launch so important? It could mark a challenge against Elon Musk's dominance in the commercial space market.

The development of New Glenn has spanned three Blue Origin CEOs and faced numerous delays as Elon Musk's SpaceX grew into an industry juggernaut with its reusable Falcon 9, the world's most active rocket.

Bezos (pictured) in late 2023 moved to speed things up at Blue Origin, prioritizing the development of New Glenn and its BE-4 engines.

He named Dave Limp, an Amazon veteran, as CEO, who employees say introduced a sense of urgency to compete with SpaceX.

New Glenn is more than twice as powerful as SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket and has dozens of customer launch contracts collectively worth billions of dollars lined up.

Lift-off has been delayed again this morning with a launch now targeted at 8:15am.

The exact reason behind these persistent delays is unknown at the moment but on a livestream the team were heard saying that engineers are 'working through a few anomalies'.

Hello and welcome to MailOnline's live coverage as Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin prepares for its inaugural launch of its New Glenn rocket from Florida early on Monday.

The launch into the Earth's orbit will mark a major step towards a long-awaited goal of competing with Elon Musk's SpaceX in the satellite launch market.

Standing 30 stories tall, the partially reusable New Glenn launcher sat on Blue Origin's launchpad at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, ready for its liftoff after being loaded with methane and liquid oxygen propellants.

The mission, the culmination of a decade-long, multi-billion-dollar development journey, will include an attempt to land New Glenn's first stage booster on a sea-fairing barge in the Atlantic Ocean 10 minutes after liftoff, while the rocket's second stage continues toward orbit.

Lift-off was originially scheduled for 1:30 am ET (06:30am) but has been pushed back to 7:48am.