14 In April, the Blue Origin company successfully made a suborbital flight of the New Shepard rocket, during which six women - among them an engineer - went into space, pop star, journalist and public activist.
The rocket was launched by 13:30 UTC from Launch Site One in West Texas. The RSS Kármán Line capsule has reached its height 106 km and returned to Earth through 10 minutes and 21 a second after the start.
This was New Shepard's eleventh manned flight and the program's 31st mission overall. A feature of NS-31 was the participation of exclusively women — for the first time since 1963 year, when Valentina Tereshkova independently went into space.
The crew included:
- Aisha Bowe is a former NASA engineer, the founder of companies in the field of technology and education;
- Kerryann Flynn is a film director, which cooperates with non-profit organizations;
- Gayle King is the host of CBS Mornings;
- Amanda Nguyen is a scientist and human rights defender;
- Katy Perry is a world-famous pop singer;
- Lauren Sanchez is a pilot, journalist and bride of Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos.
The flight attracted considerable media attention. The company conducted a 90-minute broadcast before the start, and the mission participants wore specially designed individual spacesuits, created by the fashion brand to the order of Sanchez.
However, the publicity of the flight also caused a wave of criticism. Some commentators have questioned the feasibility of "star" flights against the background of problems in the scientific field, including the firing of NASA's chief scientist Kate Calvin.
Despite this, the mission also had a scientific component. Sanchez brought with her educational equipment from the Teachers In Space organization, which contained sensors for data collection as part of educational STEM projects.
This is the third flight of New Shepard 2025 year — after the NS-30 crew mission in February and the NS-29 cargo mission at the beginning of the month, during which the capsule rotated to simulate lunar gravity conditions.
Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp confirmed, that the company will continue to develop the New Shepard program, despite the focus on the launch of the New Glenn heavy rocket and work on the Blue Moon lunar lander. The company considers suborbital flights to be an important experience, which has potential in commercial as well, and in an educational sense.
Source: https://spacenews.com/blue-origin-launches-all-woman-new-shepard-suborbital-flight/