Amazon founder Jeff Bezos successfully made a short trip to space with Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket. Bezos managed to make the visit for 11 minutes.
On the journey, the world’s richest man is accompanied by his brother, Mark Bezos, a space racing pioneer, Wally Funk, and an 18-year-old college student named Oliver Daemen.
They boarded the Blue Origin capsule which had several large windows to see the view of the earth from space.
Stories About Journeys into Space
The New Shepard rocket took off on Tuesday (20/7/2021) at 09:12 local time. New Shepard launches from a private launch site near Van Horn, Texas.
“Best day ever. My expectations were high and they were dramatically exceeded,” Jeff said as he safely landed on Earth after a flight of 10 minutes and 10 seconds.
Two minutes after the flight, the capsule separated from the rocket and continued up into the Karman Line, the best known boundary of space, 100 km above the Earth’s surface.
In a video recording the atmosphere in the New Shepard rocket, the happy faces of the passengers can be seen. They appear to be bobbing up and down because of the slight tug of gravity.
Every now and then, they seem to look out the window, looking at the view of Earth from space. Bezos admitted that he was quite surprised by the micro-gravity sensation he felt for the first time.
The four of them managed to fly for 11 minutes aboard the New Shepard capsule developed by Bezos’ company Blue Origin.
Jeff Bezos Intends to Open Space Tourism
Jeff Bezos is indeed ambitious to open space tourism opportunities. Through his company, Blue Origin, Jeff designed a special rocket called the New Shepard.
This ambition has been criticized. Bezos is considered a waste of money, where the money for this space tourism project could actually be used to pay the wages of his company employees and help fight the global climate change crisis.
Space tourism is also called only pampering the world’s super-rich. However, Bezos said that he also has a vision for the environment that is no less ambitious.
“We need to move all heavy industry, all polluting industries into space, and keep Earth as the beautiful jewel of the planet that it is today,” Bezos told MSNBC.
Bezos said the project would take a very long time. That’s why, it should be started as soon as possible.
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