Wed, May 15, 2024
Seventh Crewed SpaceFlight Now on the Books
Blue Origin has announced its anticipated launch date for the NS-25 mission, taking off from Launch Site One in West Texas on Sunday, May 19th.
The New Shepard mission will see 6 passengers through Blue Origin's seventh human spaceflight. The group will include Mason Angel, Sylvain Chiron, Kenneth L. Hess, Carol Schaller, Gopi Thotakura, and former Air Force Captain Ed Dwight. Dwight has a minor footnote in space history as the first POC chosen for astronaut candidacy, gaining the recognition of President Kennedy. Ultimately, Dwight never got to see space under NASA's care, so Blue Origin is bringing him up for a bit of sub-orbital time a few decades later. His seat was sponsored by Space for Humanity, a nonprofit dedicated to "changing global perspectives by democratizing access to space for all humanity." Given the eye-watering cost of a Blue Origin ticket, Dwight's fare was further assisted by the Jaison and Jamie Robinson Foundation.
Additional paying passengers include a handful of pilots travelers, philanthropists, adventurers, engineers, and entrepreneurs. Once they complete their flight, the half-dozen passengers will become one of 37 people Blue Origin has taken beyond the Kármán line, a measure that the company uses to more or less define their high-altitude flights as "spaceflight".
As is the norm with Blue Origin flights, they'll carry up some cargo for their foundation, Club for the Future. That allows students around the world to create and send postcards up along for a ride, intended to "inspire and mobilize future generations to pursue careers in STEAM for the benefit of Earth". Traditionally, the program has accepted handmade artwork and loaded it aboard the New Shepard, but the addition of 'digital postcards' allows kids to upload their creations, where the data will be brought along for the ride. Such postcards will be digitally stamped "Flown to Space", and their creators sent a link for kids to access their digital postcard.
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