The founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos, and his younger brother Mark will fly into space on the first passenger flight of the ship New Shepard, built by the space company Blue Origin. The billionaire announced the launch on his Instagram.
“Ever since I was five years old, I’ve dreamed of traveling to space. On July 20th, I will take that journey with my brother. The greatest adventure, with my best friend,” Bezos wrote.
Together with the brothers, the winner of the online auction will go into space, which raffled off a ticket to the ship. As of Monday morning, ticket prices had reached $2.8 million, writes CNN. The estimated completion date for the bidding is June 12th.
If all goes according to plan, Bezos will become the first owner of a space company to go into space, the TV channel said. British billionaire Richard Branson, whose company Virgin Galactic is a direct rival of Blue Origin, also plans a space flight in 2021, but the exact date is still unknown.
The New Shepard could carry up to six people into space. The ship is designed for suborbital flights to an altitude of just over 100 kilometers. Passengers will spend a few minutes in zero gravity and then return to Earth. The ship has already conducted more than a dozen successful test flights without passengers on board, including one in April.
Virgin Galactic conducted a successful test flight of the SpaceShipTwo Unity in May. The VMS Eve booster aircraft lifted it to an altitude of more than 13.7 kilometers, after which the ship flew on its own. Virgin Galactic remains to conduct three test flights before the first commercial launch.
