“We didn’t see any value, because the vehicle is automated,” Blue Origin CEO Bob Smith said. “It felt a lot cooler than it looks,” said Daeman after the launch.īlue Origin/Handout/Anadolu Agency // Getty ImagesĬompany engineers could have flown to evaluate the craft for future improvements, but declined. Clumsily inverted, writhing in the absence of gravity, the footage seems silly. While in space, the quartet cavorted, throwing skittles and small soft spheres. Over the radio, various hoots, giggles, and gales of laughter could be heard from those onboard. The four passengers in the capsule experienced 3 to 4 minutes of microgravity weightlessness, unbelted from their seats and staring out of the largest windows ever installed on a spacecraft. The supercharged liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen engine reached more than 1 million horsepower, lofting the space capsule before the pair separated. The rush of engine noise and steadily climbing airspeed belied this illusion, based on comparisons to beefier orbital vehicles. New Shepard took off from the privately built spaceport Launch Site One, located in a nearly depopulated stretch of desert 120 miles east of El Paso.īlue Origin Handout/Anadolu Agency // Getty ImagesĪt launch, the New Shepard’s single BE-3 engine sparked to life, lifting the 60-foot rocket in what appeared from 3 miles away as a gentle, slow ascent to the sky. The four passengers formed the breathing payload of the first launch of a privately funded spacecraft with people onboard.
“Best day ever!” Jeff Bezos cried while in flight, close to the flight’s 107-kilometer apogee.
The crew aboard New Shepard, Blue Origin’s reusable rocket-company founder Jeff Bezos, his brother Mark Bezos, 82-year-old Mercury 17 astronaut candidate Wally Funk, and 18-year-old paying customer Oliver Daemen-made the 11-minute flight to and from the edge of space. We will continue to update this story with new information and dispatches from Launch Site One throughout the day.Ī rocket propellant and champagne flowed freely in West Texas today as Blue Origin celebrated its historic first flight with passengers, vaulting four people-including the world’s richest man-into suborbital space. Popular Mechanics contributing writer Joe Pappalardo is in Van Horn, Texas today to watch Jeff Bezos and three other passengers ride in the first human spaceflight for Blue Origin.
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