By Gayle King, Katy Perry and Lauren Sánchez will join three other women on the next mission from Jeff Bezos’ rocket company, Blue Origin announced on Thursday.
The 11th crewed flight of the company’s New Shepard rocket is set to blast off this spring, it said, though Blue Origin did not give a date.
King, cohost of “CBS Mornings”; Sanchez, Bezos’ girlfriend; and Perry, a popstar, will fly alongside former NASA rocket scientist Aisha Bowe, bioastronautics research scientist Amanda Nguyen and movie producer Kerianne Flynn to round out the all-female crew of six.
New Shepard completed its 10th crewed flight on Tuesday just outside of Van Horn, Texas.
The journeys are brief, lasting around 11 minutes. Passengers reach an altitude of just over 100 kilometers (62 miles), which is considered the boundary between Earth and space. The suborbital vehicle — which is autonomous and flies without a pilot — returns after they’ve experienced a few minutes of views and weightlessness. Three large parachutes slow its descent to facilitate a safe touchdown.
Previous notable names who have gone on such flights include company founder Bezos, “Star Trek” actor William Shatner, former New York Giants great Michael Strahan and astronaut Alan Shepard’s daughter Laura Shepard Churchley.
The rocket is named after the elder Shepard, the first American in space.
A ticket to ride New Shepard costs well into the six digits, though no formal price tag is listed on the company’s website.
The Blue Origin ticketing application reminds would-be space travelers that the company “will collect a $150,000 USD fully refundable deposit to begin the order process.”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
