Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin company blasted its third private crew into space on Saturday and brought it back safely, this time including the daughter of the first American in space.
The stubby white spacecraft with a round tip blasted off into clear blue skies over West Texas for a trip of about 11 minutes to slightly beyond the internationally recognised boundary of space, 100 kilometres high.
The six-member crew shouted with glee as they unbuckled to enjoy a few minutes of weightlessness, looking out at space through tall windows in the capsule.
“I have never seen anything like that,” one crew member said in audio captured during the live-streaming of the flight by Blue Origin.
The capsule quickly returned to Earth for a gentle parachute landing in the desert, kicking up a cloud of dust as it touched down.
Mr Bezos and other company officials rushed to greet the crew members as they emerged smiling from the capsule. The booster rocket touched down separately and also safely.
“We had a great flight today,” Blue Origin chief executive Bob Smith said.
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UAE adventurer Hamish Harding and five other passengers launched to the edge of space on Blue Origin's New Shepard flight on June 4. Photo: Blue Origin screenshot -
Hamish Harding (second to right) with his fellow passengers prepare for their upcoming NS-21 Blue Origin space tourism flight. Katya Echazarreta (right), Victor Correa Hespanha (third to right), Jaison Robinson (third to left), Victor Vescovo (second to left) and Evan Dick (left). Photo: Blue Origin -
Hamish Harding, a British businessman in the UAE, will fly to the edge of space on a Blue Origin flight. Chris Whiteoak / The National -
From left: Dylan Taylor, Lane Bess, Cameron Bess, Laura Shepard Churchley, Michael Strahan and Evan Dick were launched into space onboard a Blue Origin rocket on Saturday, December 11, 2021. AP -
Billionaire Jeff Bezos, founder of e-commerce company Amazon and Blue Origin, with the crew before the commercial space flight near Van Horn, Texas. Reuters -
Jeff Bezos walks behind the crew as they proceed to board Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket. Reuters -
Blast off as the New Shepard rocket heads for space. Blue Origin said that Michael Strahan and Laura Shepard Churchley were 'honorary guests' while the rest of the crew were paying customers. AFP -
The New Shepard rocket soon after launch. The mission is Blue Origin's third manned space flight. AFP -
Spectators near Van Horn, Texas, watch as Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket heads for space. AFP -
Among the crew of the New Shepard rocket was Laura Shepard Churchley, daughter of the first American in space, Alan Shepard, after whom the spacecraft was named. Reuters -
Blue Origin’s New Shepard crew capsule returns back to Earth after a brief suborbital flight on Saturday, December 11, 2021. AFP -
The crew capsule soon after landing in West Texas. AFP -
Laura Shepard Churchley leads the crew after their return from space. She brought along a small piece of her father's capsule and some mementos from his later trip to the lunar surface aboard Apollo 14 in 1971. AFP -
The commercial space flight was slightly longer than 10 minutes and reached an altitude of about 100 kilometres. It was five minutes and 186km shorter than Alan Shepard's inaugural flight. AFP -
Laura Shepard Churchley wears her father's Naval Academy class ring after her trip to space. Reuters -
'Good Morning America' co-anchor and former NFL star Michael Strahan with Laura Shepard Churchley on the landing pad after their return from space. AFP
Laura Shepard Churchley, whose father Alan Shepard became the first American to travel to space in 1961, flew as a guest of Blue Origin.
The company's suborbital rocket is named New Shepard in honour of the pioneering astronaut.
Michael Strahan, an American football Hall of Famer turned TV personality, was also a guest, while there were four paying customers: space industry executive and philanthropist Dylan Taylor, investor Evan Dick, Bess Ventures founder Lane Bess and his son Cameron.
Lane and Cameron became the first parent and child to fly together to space. The cost of tickets on the suborbital flight were not disclosed.
Alan Shepard made US history with a 15-minute suborbital space flight on May 5, 1961, slightly under a month after the Soviet Union's Yuri Gagarin became the first person in space when he orbited the planet.
Mr Shepard, who died in 1998, went on to be the fifth of 12 men to have set foot on the Moon.
“It is kind of fun for me to say an original Shepard will fly on the New Shepard,” Ms Shepard Churchley, who runs a foundation that promotes science and raises funds for college students, said in a video before the flight. “I am very proud of my father's legacy.”
Previous Blue Origin flights took the company's billionaire founder Jeff Bezos and Star Trek actor William Shatner to space.
Mr Bezos, who made his fortune with Amazon, envisages a future in which humanity disperses throughout the solar system, living and working in giant space colonies with artificial gravity.
This, he says, would leave Earth as a pristine tourism destination similar to national parks today.
The year 2021 has been significant for the space tourism sector, with Virgin Galactic also flying its founder Richard Branson to the final frontier and Elon Musk's SpaceX sending four private citizens on a three-day orbital mission for charity.
