A new group of space tourists are about to follow in the footsteps of Katy Perry, Gayle King and more than 50 others by boarding a Blue Origin spacecraft for a brief trip high above Earth.
Blue Origin, the commercial spaceflight company founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, is preparing to send six more people to the edge of space as early as Saturday, May 31. The impending launch would be the company’s first since its highly publicized human spaceflight in April featuring a group of six well-known women, including Bezos’ fiancée.
The crew of six people, whose names Blue Origin announced May 22, would join a growing list of influential civilians who have had the rare privilege of serving as passengers on the company’s New Shepard spacecraft. New Shepard, which launches from Blue Origin’s private launch facility in west Texas, takes its passengers more than 60 miles high to experience a few minutes of weightlessness and spectacular views of Earth.
Here’s everything to know about the upcoming mission, which would be New Shepard’s 12th human spaceflight and 32nd flight overall.
Does Jeff Bezos own Blue Origin? What to know about spaceflight company
Billionaire Jeff Bezos, best known for founding Amazon, is the founder of the private space technology company Blue Origin.
Bezos himself even boarded Blue Origin’s New Shepard for its maiden crewed voyage in July 2021, which came after the spacecraft flew on 15 flight tests beginning in 2012. For nearly four years since its first crewed mission, the New Shepard spacecraft has served as a powerful symbol of Blue Origin’s commercial spaceflight ambitions amid a growing space tourism industry.
In addition to sending space tourists on brief joy rides to the edge of space, Blue Origin has also increasingly sought to compete with Elon Musk’s SpaceX.
Blue Origin’s massive New Glenn rocket, which flew on its inaugural flight test in January, is also being developed for future spaceflights. At 320 feet tall, the spacecraft rivals SpaceX’s 400-foot Starship in size.
Even Amazon is competing with SpaceX by developing its own Kuiper internet satellite constellation in a direct challenge to Starlink.
When is the next Blue Origin launch?
Blue Origin’s next crewed launch, known as NS-32, could get off the ground as early as 8:30 a.m. CT (9:30 a.m. ET) Saturday, May 31, the company announced announced Tuesday, May 27.
Blue Origin New Shepard rocket launches take place from the company’s private ranch facility known as Launch Site One in Van Horn, Texas – more than 140 miles east of El Paso.
Who is the crew of next Blue Origin mission?
When the New Shepard gets off the ground again, the six people selected to board it will join 58 others who have flown on the spacecraft across 11 previous human spaceflights.
Here’s a look at the passengers:
Katy Perry, Gayle King, Lauren Sanchez part of celebrity all-female Blue Origin flight
The upcoming Blue Origin launch comes on the heels of a headline-grabbing celebrity spaceflight on April 14 featuring musical artist Katy Perry and broadcast journalist Gayle King.
Also on the flight for the mission known as NS-31 was civil rights activist and bioastronautics research scientist Amanda Nguyen, former NASA rocket scientist Aisha Bowe, filmmaker Kerianne Flynn and Lauren Sánchez, an Emmy Award-winning journalist who is the fiancée of Jeff Bezos.
The women made history as the first all-female crew to travel to space since 1963, when the Soviet Union’s Valentina Tereshkova completed a solo spaceflight, Blue Origin has said.
But the women who were part of the mission also faced widespread backlash for a launch that was widely criticized as a marketing ploy that contributed to Earth’s pollution.
What happens during a Blue Origin rocket launch?
Each spaceflight on a New Shepard vehicle lasts about 11 minutes from liftoff to capsule touchdown.
Named after astronaut Alan Shepard, the first American in space, the 60-foot-tall New Shepard rocket is topped with the gum drop-shaped crew capsule.
During its ascent, the spacecraft reaches supersonic speeds surpassing 2,000 mph before the rocket booster separates from the crew capsule. At that point, those aboard the capsule become weightless as the spacecraft continues toward its highest point on its brief voyage above the Kármán Line – the 62-mile-high internationally recognized boundary of space.
While experiencing a few minutes of microgravity, passengers have the opportunity to unstrap themselves from their seats to gaze out the capsule’s large windows and take in a stunning view of Earth.
Meanwhile, the rocket booster heads back to the ground while firing its engines and using its fins to slow and control its descent to land about two miles from the launchpad.
The capsule itself eventually begins what Blue Origin refers to as a “stable freefall” – plummeting back to Earth as three massive parachutes deploy and the capsule makes a soft landing in the desert, sending up plumes of dust.
How much does it cost to ride Blue Origin?
If you have dreams of blasting off to orbit on a Blue Origin spacecraft, you likely need to either have very deep pockets or a name that’s recognizable enough to get you invited as an honored guest.
Though Blue Origin does not publicly list prices on its website, a form to reserve a seat requires customers to agree to a $150,000 deposit alone.
And if the price of the first ticket sold for a Blue Origin spaceflight in 2021 is any indicator, seats likely cost in the millions of dollars. The $28 million ticket price was the winning bid in an auction that included 7,600 people registered to bid from 159 countries.
However, a select few passengers over the years have had their seats aboard New Shepard paid through grants and other funding methods from large institutions.
Eric Lagatta is the Space Connect reporter for the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at elagatta@gannett.com
This article originally appeared on El Paso Times: When is the next Blue Origin launch? What to know about New Shepard liftoff, crew
Reporting by Eric Lagatta, USA TODAY NETWORK / El Paso Times
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