by Douglas Messier
Managing Editor

An anonymous person bid $28 million on Saturday to fly into space next month along with Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

Bidding for a seat on Blue Origin’s New Shepard suborbital vehicle with Jeff Bezos ended on Thursday with the top bid at $4.8 million. The auction, which began on May 5, will conclude on Saturday, June 12 with a live bidding session that will be streamed at www.blueorigin.com. The session will start at 1 p.m. EDT/17:00 UTC. The winner will join Bezos and his brother Mark on New Shepard’s first […]

KENT, Wash. (Blue Origin PR) — Blue Origin will broadcast the live auction for the very first seat on New Shepard on Saturday, June 12th, BlueOrigin.com. The webcast will begin at 12:45 p.m. EDT/16:45 UTC. After a month-long process with nearly 6,000 participants from 143 countries, the current high bid stands at $3.5 million.   Anyone interested in bidding in the live auction must register by June 10th. Registration details can be found at BlueOrigin.com.   The winning bidder will fly […]

This morning, Blue Origin unveiled bids for a seat on New Shepard’s first suborbital crewed flight on July 20. The top bid was $1.4 million, an amount that has since increased to $2.2 million in open bidding. The bids are now increasing at an automatic $200,000, not including a 6 percent buyer’s premium on the total amount. Blue Origin said it received bids from more than 5,200 people living in […]

KENT, Wash. (Blue Origin PR) — On July 20^th, New Shepard will fly its first astronaut crew to space. We are offering one seat on this first flight to the winning bidder of Blue Origin’s online auction. Starting today, anyone can place an opening bid by going to www.BlueOrigin.com.  

Here are the three phases of the auction: 

• May 5-19: Sealed online bidding – you can bid any amount you want on the auction website (no bids are visible)  
• May 19: Unsealed online bidding –  bidding becomes visible and participants must exceed the highest bid to continue in the auction 
• June 12: Live auction – the bidding concludes with a live online auction 

VAN HORN, Texas (Blue Origin PR) — Blue Origin successfully completed its 15th consecutive mission to space and back today and conducted a series of simulations to rehearse astronaut movements and operations for future flights with customers on board. This mission marked a verification step prior to flying astronauts.

VAN HORN, Texas (Blue Origin PR) — Blue Origin’s New Shepard NS-15 flight is targeting liftoff on Wednesday, April 14, from Launch Site One in West Texas. The launch window opens at 8:00 AM CDT/13:00 UTC.

VAN HORN, Texas, January 14, 2021 (Blue Origin PR) — Blue Origin successfully completed its 14th mission to space and back today for the New Shepard program. 

by Clare Skelly
NASA Headquarters

WASHINGTON — From the rim of Shackleton crater to permanently shadowed regions on the Moon, a NASA-developed sensor suite could allow robotic and crewed missions to land precisely on the lunar surface within an area about half the size of a football field.

Technologies to enable exact and soft landings on the Moon and other worlds will fly on Blue Origin’s next New Shepard suborbital rocket launch, currently targeted for 11:00 a.m. EDT Thursday, Sept. 24. The company’s live launch webcast will start at 10:30 a.m. and air on NASA Television and the agency’s website.

Next New Shepard Launch Will Test Key Technologies with NASA for Returning to the Moon 

KENT, Wash. (Blue Origin PR) — Blue Origin’s next New Shepard mission (NS-13) is currently targeting liftoff for Thursday, September 24, at 10:00 am CDT / 15:00 UTC. Current weather conditions are favorable. This will be the 13th New Shepard mission and the 7th consecutive flight for this particular vehicle (a record), demonstrating its operational reusability. 

You can watch the launch live at BlueOrigin.com. The pre-show begins at T-30 minutes and will provide mission details, including a special update from NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine.