Blue Origin’s next crewed mission on its New Shepard suborbital spaceship is set to launch from West Texas, with a scheduled time of 8:30 a.m. CT on Sunday. The crew will include Ed Dwight, a 90-year-old retired military test pilot who missed out on becoming America’s first Black astronaut in the early 1960s due to racial prejudice. Dwight’s flight is sponsored by two nonprofit organizations. The other members of the crew include a venture capitalist, a brewery founder, a software engineer, a retired CPA, and an airplane pilot and entrepreneur.
The newly unveiled patch for the NS-25 mission reflects the crew’s interests, including a Gemini spacecraft representing Dwight’s aerospace training era and a starry hand symbolizing his career as an artist. Other symbols on the patch represent the crew members’ passions and experiences, such as climbing, skiing, and developing software. The mission is expected to follow the standard New Shepard flight plan, with the crew experiencing zero gravity and gazing out of the capsule’s picture windows before a parachute-aided landing. The booster will land autonomously.
Blue Origin had to suspend New Shepard flights in August 2022 due to a launch anomaly during an uncrewed research mission. After taking corrective actions, including redesigning the booster’s engine and nozzle, the company successfully resumed flights with an uncrewed mission in December. This upcoming crewed mission will be the first since then. Blue Origin’s flight arrangements are kept private, and the company has not disclosed how much its spaceflight customers are paying. Jeff Bezos previously mentioned that demand for private spaceflight is very high, with the company approaching $100 million in sales already.
If the scheduled launch goes as planned, Dwight would become the oldest person to take a suborbital space trip, exceeding the record set by William Shatner in 2021. Blue Origin’s mission would allow Dwight to fulfill his dream of space travel decades after his initial opportunity was taken away. Despite the challenges and delays, Blue Origin is ready to continue its efforts to make space travel accessible to private individuals. The success of this upcoming mission will pave the way for future crewed flights on the New Shepard suborbital spaceship, continuing the company’s commitment to advancing the history of spaceflight.
