Amazon tycoon Bezos is ready to ride his rocket into space

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Jeff Bezos, the richest man on Earth, will ride his rocket into outer space on Tuesday, an important moment for a nascent industry seeking to make the final frontier accessible to elite tourists.

Blue Origin has planned its first manned mission, an 11-minute jump from West Texas to beyond the Karman Line and back again, to coincide with the 52nd anniversary of the first moon landing.

Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Galactic, made the trip on July 11, narrowly beating the Amazon mogul in his battle with billionaires.

But Bezos, like Branson, insists it wasn’t a contest.

“There is one person who was the first person in space – his name is Yuri Gagarin – and it happened a long time ago,” he said on NBC’s TODAY program on Monday, referring to the Soviet cosmonaut’s mentor in 1961.

“This is not a competition, it’s about building a path to space so that future generations can do incredible things in space,” he added.

Blue Origin’s sights are also set higher: both in the altitude that New Shepard’s reusable spacecraft will ascend compared to the Virgin space plane, but also in its ambitions.

Bezos, 57, founded Blue Origin in 2000 with the goal of one day building artificially-gravity, floating space colonies where millions of people would work and live.

Today, the company is developing a heavy-lift orbital rocket called New Glenn and also a lunar lander it hopes to contract with NASA.

New Shepard conducted 15 unmanned flights to put it through its paces and test safety mechanisms, such as launching the capsule away from the launch pad in the event of a missile exploding, or landing with one parachute lower.

“We’ve learned how to make the car safe enough that we’re willing to put our loved ones on it, and send them into space,” Blue Origin CEO Bob Smith said at a news briefing on Sunday.

Takeoff takes place at 8:00 a.m. Central time (1300 GMT) from a remote facility in the West Texas desert called Launch Site One, 25 miles (40 kilometers) north of the nearest town, Van Horn.

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Weather conditions are currently looking favourable and the event will be streamed live on BlueOrigin.com, starting 90 minutes before launch.

– Richest, biggest, smallest –

Bezos will be joined by barrier-breaking pilot Wally Funk, who, at 82, is set to be the oldest astronaut ever, and 18-year-old Dutchman Oliver Damen, who will become their youngest.

The quartet concluded with Jeff Bezos’ younger brother and best friend Mark, who runs the Bezos Family Foundation and works as a volunteer firefighter.

Notably, the still-unidentified winner of a $28 million auction for a seat had a “scheduling conflict” and would take part in a future flight.

Damon’s father, the CEO of the private equity firm, was a runner-up in the bidding, allowing his teenage son to become the company’s first paying client.

After liftoff, the New Shepard will blast off into space at speeds in excess of 2,300 mph (3,700 km/h) using a liquid-oxygen liquid-hydrogen engine only byproduct of water vapor.

The capsule detaches from its booster, and when it rises sufficiently, the astronauts detach and experience weightlessness for three to four minutes.

The spacecraft’s height is 65 miles (106 kilometers), allowing crew members to admire the curvature of the planet, and the grainy black of the rest of the universe.

The booster returns independently to the landing platform just north of the launch site, while the free capsule returns to Earth with three giant parachutes, and finally the thruster, for a gentle landing in the desert.

Funk, who excelled in Project Mercury 13 that was meant to train women for space but was denied the opportunity to go because of sexism at the start of the space age, said she plans to make the most of the opportunity.

She told NBC she was looking forward to floating, curling, and rolling in near-zero gravity.

– ‘Read the room’ –

Blue Origin has remained relatively shy about what comes next.

The company says it plans two more trips this year, and then “many” next year.

Analysts say much will depend on early successes and building a strong safety record.

Smith, the chief executive, revealed on Sunday that the next launch could take place in September or October, adding that “the willingness to pay is still very high.”

At the same time, the sector is beginning to face criticism over the optics of wealthy individuals blasting into space as Earth faces climate-driven disasters and the coronavirus pandemic.

“Could there be a worse time for two wealthy rocket owners on a short trip into the dark?” Shannon Styron wrote in the Atlantic article, “Space Billionaires, Please Read The Room.”

ia / jh

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