VAN HORN, Texas, Dec 11 – The eldest daughter of pioneering U.S.
Bezos arrived with members of Blue Origin’s recovery team to greet and embrace the newly minted citizen astronauts as they emerged from the capsule, all smiles, in their blue flight suits.
The spacecraft itself is named for Alan Shepard, who in 1961 made history as the second person, and the first American, to travel into space – a 15-minute suborbital flight as one of NASA’s original “Mercury Seven” astronauts.
Billionaire Jeff Bezos, founder of ecommerce company Amazon.com Inc, sits with the crew of a scheduled flight before they board Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket near Van Horn, Texas, U.S.
Churchley was one of two honorary, non-paying guest passengers chosen by Blue Origin for Saturday’s flight.
They were joined by four lesser-known, wealthy customers who paid undisclosed but presumably hefty sums for their New Shepard seats – space industry executive Dylan Taylor, engineer-investor Evan Dick, venture capitalist Lane Bess and his 23-year-old son, Cameron Bess.
Actor William Shatner, who embodied the promise of space travel in his role as Captain James T.
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