Well, it’s official. Lots of people seem to really hate Jeff Bezos. As of this writing, two online petitions on Change.org have garnered nearly 117,000 signatures urging that the Amazon founder not be allowed to return to Earth during his July 20 trip to space aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard capsule. (The petitions are here and here.) “Billionaire’s should not exist…on earth, or in space, but should they decide the […]
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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.
(more…)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 […]
by Douglas Messier
Managing Editor
For eight years, they thundered aloft in cramped Russian spacecraft from a former Soviet spaceport in Kazakhstan, battling bureaucracy and gravity to blaze a trail across the heavens and redefine what it meant to be a space traveler. No longer would access to orbit be limited to highly trained astronauts chosen on merit and working on behalf of their nations; instead, space would be open to any sufficiently healthy people with enough money and moxie to qualify.
(more…)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 […]
Fourth of July weekend could include some extra fireworks this year.
Updated with statement from Virgin Galactic on June 8, 2021 at 10:53 a.m. PDT.
by Douglas Messier
Managing Editor
It looks like Richard Branson could beat fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos to space next month.
Virgin Galactic is working on a plan to send Branson on a suborbital flight aboard the VSS Unity SpaceShipTwo rocket plane over the July 4 holiday weekend, according to a source who requested anonymity. The flight is contingent upon obtaining an operator’s license from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
(more…)Blue Origin announced on Monday that founder Jeff Bezos and his brother Mark will join the winner of an auction on the first crewed suborbital flight of the company’s New Shepard vehicle from west Texas on July 20. The fully reusable rocket and capsule system has flown 15 suborbital flight tests without anyone aboard with a record of 14 successes and one partial failure. The latter came on the systems’ […]