Blue Origin's next space tourism flight will launch on Aug. 29

3 weeks ago 19

a white rocket launches into a blue sky, as seen from the ground

Blue Origin's New Shepard vehicle launches on the NS-25 crewed suborbital mission, on May 19, 2024. (Image credit: Blue Origin)

Blue Origin will launch its eighth human spaceflight this week, if all goes according to plan.

Jeff Bezos' company is targeting Thursday (Aug. 29) for NS-26, its latest suborbital space tourism mission. The reusable New Shepard rocket-capsule combo is scheduled to lift off from Blue Origin's West Texas site at 9 a.m. EDT (1300 GMT; 8 a.m. local Texas time).

You'll be able to watch the action live: Blue Origin will livestream the launch, beginning at 8:20 a.m. EDT (1220 GMT).

photo collage showing headshots of six people — four men and two women

Six people will fly on NS-26: philanthropist and entrepreneur Nicolina Elrick, university professor Rob Ferl, businessman Eugene Grin, cardiologist Eiman Jahangir, college student Karsen Kitchen and entrepreneur Ephraim Rabin.

Kitchen, a 21-year-old senior at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, will set a record on NS-26, according to Blue Origin. She'll become the youngest woman to cross the 62-mile-high (100 kilometers) Kármán line, which many people regard as the boundary where outer space begins.

However, NASA and the U.S. military give astronaut wings to anyone who flies above 50 miles (80 km). The youngest woman to reach that altitude was 18-year-old Anastatia Mayers, who did so on a suborbital flight with Virgin Galactic in August 2023.

illustration of a space mission patch, with "ns26" written above a greenish space capsule

New Shepard flights last 10 to 12 minutes from liftoff to the parachute-aided touchdown of the crew capsule. Blue Origin has not revealed how much it charges for a seat aboard the suborbital vehicle.

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The company launched its first crewed mission on July 20, 2021, the 52nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing. That New Shepard flight carried Bezos, his brother Mark, aviation pioneer Wally Funk and Dutch student Oliver Daemen.

NS-26 will be the 26th New Shepard flight overall (hence the name) and the vehicle's eighth crewed mission. It will be the second New Shepard launch of the year, after NS-25 this past May.

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Michael Wall is a Senior Space Writer with Space.com and joined the team in 2010. He primarily covers exoplanets, spaceflight and military space, but has been known to dabble in the space art beat. His book about the search for alien life, "Out There," was published on Nov. 13, 2018. Before becoming a science writer, Michael worked as a herpetologist and wildlife biologist. He has a Ph.D. in evolutionary biology from the University of Sydney, Australia, a bachelor's degree from the University of Arizona, and a graduate certificate in science writing from the University of California, Santa Cruz. To find out what his latest project is, you can follow Michael on Twitter.

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