Today is the day that Jeff Bezos will go to space aboard his Blue Origin rocket along with an 18-year-old who was lucky enough to get a seat after a mystery bidder had a “scheduling conflict” and couldn’t make the flight.
The stream goes live at 13:30 this afternoon and you can watch a billionaire go on their joyride above the Karman Line here or via the embedded stream below.
The stream starts 90 minutes before launch so we should see lift-off at around 15:30 local time, barring any delays of course.
While we’re not too interested in Bezos going to space, streams such as this usually host astrophysicists, rocket scientists, astronomers and more. This means you can learn some rather cool stuff about space flight, rockets and the company – in this case Blue Origin – while we wait for ignition.
As mentioned, despite placing a winning bid of $28 million for a seat aboard Blue Origin, the mystery bidder can’t make the flight. Going in their place is 18-year-old Oliver Daemen whose father actually placed the second highest bid during the auction.
This means that New Shepard will be taking the youngest person and oldest person to space at the same time. The oldest person is 82-year-old Wally Funk.
Our astronauts have completed training and are a go for launch. #NSFirstHumanFlight pic.twitter.com/rzkQgqVaB6
— Blue Origin (@blueorigin) July 19, 2021
If all goes according to plan then Blue Origin will take three major accolades. The third is that it will take its billionaire owner to space aboard their own vessel.
While Richard Branson went close to space last week, Virgin Galactic never passed the Karman Line which is regarded as the boundary between Earth’s atmosphere and the deep inky void of space. We could debate whether the Karman Line is technically space but we’re not qualified enough for that so we’re going on officially recognised definitions.
As mentioned the stream kicks off at 13:30. Grab some popcorn and queue up Bezos II from Bo Burnham.
[Image – CC 0 Pixabay]
