Jeff Bezos, the Amazon founder-turned-private space entrepreneur and philanthropist, reached the lower reaches of space over the West Texas desert early on Tuesday, fulfilling a boyhood dream and ending a long series of delays for his private space company.
The world's richest man and three others were propelled to a height of 107km, some 7km above the internationally recognised boundary of space, on an 18m rocket built by Blue Origin.
They experienced about three minutes of weightlessness and views of the Earth through giant portholes the company has dubbed the “largest windows in space”, before their capsule drifted back to the desert floor for a soft landing under three parachutes.
The Amazon founder, who has faced criticism for spending billions on his personal jaunt into space, has dismissed claims that he is turning his back on more serious issues. “We’ll be building a road to space, to do amazing things that solve problems here on Earth,” he told CNN before Tuesday’s flight.
He has said that development in space will eventually ease the burdens on the planet, claiming: “All polluting industry will move off Earth, and Earth will end up zoned residential.”
The launch marks the first for a paying passenger on a rocket to be entirely developed and operated by a private company. Oliver Daemen (18), the son of a Dutch hedge fund manager, was given a last-minute place on the flight after the unnamed winner of an auction for the seat cried off due to what the company called a "scheduling conflict".
"This is a big moment for commercial space, it's hugely significant," said Greg Autry, a former White House liaison to Nasa. Besides signalling the beginning of suborbital space tourism, the flight showed Blue Origin had perfected technologies that would power far more ambitious launches in future, he added.
Grand plan
A grinning Mr Bezos emerged from the capsule minutes after touchdown in a battered cowboy hat to exchange high-fives with a gaggle of well-wishers who had rushed to the landing site. He had climbed the tower to the capsule 30 minutes before the planned launch, after being driven to the rocket in a Rivian electric van – the vehicle Amazon plans to turn into the main workhorse for its ecommerce deliveries.
The 10-minute excursion marked the launch of Blue Origin’s suborbital space tourism business and the biggest step yet in Bezos’s grand plan to turn humanity into a space-borne civilisation.
The trip follows years of slow progress that have consumed billions of dollars of his personal fortune, and comes two weeks after the 57-year-old stepped aside as chief executive officer of Amazon to free himself for personal enthusiasms.
The ecommerce pioneer was beaten to space by Sir Richard Branson, who rode a Virgin Galactic spaceplane to a height of 86km nine days ago. But while the British entrepreneur has set his sights squarely on space tourism, Mr Bezos has more expansive plans.
Blue Origin is also working on a giant rocket capable of reaching orbit, a family of engines it has offered to other rocket companies, and a lunar lander – things that he claims will benefit from his company’s first foray to the edge of space.
The New Shepard rocket, named after the US astronaut Alan Shepard, launched from a site near Van Horn, a strip of shabby motels surrounded by sagebrush and scrubland where locals have been hoping for an economic boost from the new space venture.
In a rare dash of colour and hope marking the optimism that the Amazon founder has promised to bring to the area, a large mural painted on one city corner depicts a smiling Mr Bezos striking a heroic pose in aviator glasses, a blue Earth looming behind him.
Mr Bezos's brother, Mark, and Wally Funk (82), once a member of the first female intake at Nasa to undergo astronaut training, were also on board the Blue Origin flight, its first to carry passengers. – Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2021