the space company Blue Origin announced this Friday that the next flight of its rocket will take place on May 20 with six passengers on board, including the first woman born in Mexico to go into space.
Takeoff is scheduled for 8:30 a.m. (1:30 p.m.) from West Texas, United States. It will be the fifth manned spaceflight for the company of billionaire Jeff Bezos.
Katya Echazarreta, born in Guadalajara, Mexico, came to the United States at the age of seven. Now the 26-year-old engineer will become the youngest American woman to go into space.
She was sponsored by the “Space for Humanity” program, which selected her from among 7,000 applicants as part of its goal of democratizing access to space.
The crew will also include the second Brazilian to go into space, Victor Correa Hespanha.
Blue Origin will transport its clients along the Karman Line, which marks the beginning of the space according to the international convention, at a height of 100 km. The flight takes only about ten minutes in total.
Passengers can slide out of their seats, float for a few moments in weightlessness and admire the curvature of the Earth through large windows.
The price paid by space tourists to get on board is unknown.
Bezos himself participated in the first manned flight of the New Shepard rocket in July 2021. Since then, the rocket has also transported the actor who plays the iconic Captain Kirk from the Star Trek series, William Shatner, and Laura Shepard Churchley, daughter of the First American to go into space.
