It was billed to be one of the busiest days in space history with four rockets scheduled to launch back-to-back in the space of just a few hours.

But the stars failed to align on Tuesday, with three out of four launches scrubbed due to high-altitude winds, technical problems and issues with one rocket's ground infrastructure.

Elon Musk's SpaceX was due to send a new US spy satellite into orbit at 2pm GMT today on its Falcon 9 rocket.

A mere 19 minutes later, rival Blue Origin, which is the brainchild of Amazon's billionaire founder Jeff Bezos, was expected to complete a research flight from its New Shepard 10 rocket.

The launch would have carried nine experiments for Nasa and will test a suborbital capsule.

However, both launches were postponed at the last minute.

Blue Origin said its launch was cancelled due to a "ground infrastructure issue." It will now launch on Wednesday morning.

SpaceX missed its launch window after an abort order was triggered by the flight computer on the Falcon 9 rocket. Musk's firm will now attempt he launch tomorrow.

The flights were due to be followed by a French launch of a defence satellite, which was also scrubbed.

Another launch, a classified US launch of a Delta IV heavy rocket carrying a spy satellite is expected to still take place at Vandenberg Air Force Base at 8:57 p.m. ET.