Technology: Blue Origin’s New Shepherd will ferry its first astronaut crew accompanied by Jeff Bezos on board on July 20. The Amazon founder along with his brother is all set to tour the space on Blue Origin’s New Shepard spacecraft on its first human space flight.
Blue Origin, Bezos spacecraft company comes as competition to Tesla CEO Elon Musk. The company conducted an online auction to reserve a seat on his new bird to space. The online bidding was carried out in a bi-phased manner with a sealed auction between May 5-9 and unsealed open bidding on May 19. The last stage of the bidding is expected to be concluded on June 12.
The winning bidder would be awarded a chance to visit space along with Bezos and his brother on board.
Taking to his Instagram handle, Bezos expressed his joy about the trip. His post read,” Ever since I was five years old, I’ve dreamed of traveling to space. On July 20th, I will take that journey with my brother.”
The amount collected from the bid is determined to be donated to Blue Origin’s foundation, Club for the Future, “to inspire future generations to pursue careers in STEM and help invent the future of life in space”, Blue Origin had said.
The spacecraft was named so to honour the first American to fly to space, Alan Shepherd. The aircraft has undergone 15 successful trials in May conducting consecutive missions to space and back above the Karman Line through a meticulous along with incremental flight program to test New Shepherd’s multiple redundant safety systems.