A seat of the Blue Origin “New Shepard” manned maiden flight on July 20 was finally sold at auction for $28 million, but the identity of the winning bidder was not immediately announced.
On June 12th local time, Blue Origin, a space company under billionaire Jeff Bezos, announced that nearly 7,600 people registered to participate in the seat bidding for the “New Shepard” suborbital vehicle, and the first seat was finally auctioned at a price of 28 million U.S. dollars.
This space tour will last 10 minutes. The winning bidder can fly to space by “New Shepard” or appoint another person to complete the space tour . Blue Origin said in a statement that the identity of the winning bidder will be announced within a few weeks, and the last member of the four-person crew will also be announced at the same time.
The other two passengers on this space journey are billionaire Jeff Bezos and his brother Mark Bezos (Mark Bezos) .
On June 7, Jeff Bezos announced on social media that he will participate in the first launch of “New Shepard” as a passenger on July 20 People fly, and his brother Mark Bezos will also participate.
“I have been dreaming of space travel since I was five years old. On July 20th, I will embark on this journey with my brother.” Bezo Si said in a post on social media.
“New Shepard” is named after Alan Shepard, the first American astronaut to enter space, and consists of two parts: a rocket and a crew capsule Composition, both can be reused, the crew cabin has 6 seats. The aircraft being developed by Blue Origin plans to send humans and payloads to suborbital space and return.
As of April this year, “New Shepard” has completed its 15th unmanned test flight and returned from above the Carmen line. On May 5, Blue Origin announced the online auction of a seat for the first manned flight of the “New Shepard”. The auction ended on June 12 and the first manned flight is scheduled to start on July 20.