The company, started by the Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, reset its countdown clock repeatedly over a period of just over two hours before eventually postponing the test flight to another day.

Blue Origin, the rocket company Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos founded, notched one of the most substantial successes in its history on Thursday: sending a rocket to orbit.

Florida’s sky briefly lit up during the night as one of a handful of big new American-made rockets took flight. It was the first time a new space company achieved orbit on the first launch attempt.