New Delhi:

Jeff Bezos-backed Blue Origin resumed its space flight today, after a two-year hiatus. A group of six adventurers completed an 11-minute journey to space after liftoff from Texas.

Mission NS-25 is the seventh crewed mission for Blue Origin, the space company founded and owned by Jeff Bezos.

30-year-old Gopi Thotakura, a pilot from Andhra Pradesh, was also part of the six-man crew. Preserve Life Corp, a medical institution close to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport that focuses mostly on holistic health methods, was co-founded by Gopi Thotakura.

He has become the first Indian to travel into space as a tourist on Blue Origin’s return flight.

“It was amazing… you have to see it with your eyes”, said Gopi Thotakura after his space trip.

“I can’t describe how it is to look into space… everybody should go to the space. It was good to see Earth from the other side,” he added.

“Gopi Thotakura is a lifelong pilot and aviator who learned how to fly before he could drive. He flies jets commercially, in addition to piloting bush, aerobatic, and seaplanes. He’s also the co-founder of Preserve Life Corp, a global center for holistic wellness and applied health”, said Blue Origin about the Indian crew member on social media platform X.

Gopi Thotakura is a lifelong pilot and aviator who learned how to fly before he could drive. He flies jets commercially, in addition to piloting bush, aerobatic, and seaplanes. He’s also the co-founder of Preserve Life Corp, a global center for holistic wellness and applied… pic.twitter.com/of2nzsPvEd

— Blue Origin (@blueorigin) May 19, 2024

The other crew members included Mason Angel, Sylvain Chiron, Kenneth L. Hess, Carol Schallera, and Ed Dwight.

90-year-old Dwight surpassed Star Trek star William Shatner, who was nearly two months younger, to become the oldest person to travel into space.

Ed Dwight is the first American Black man to be trained as an astronaut. Dwight was unable to achieve his goal of being the first black astronaut in space in 1961.

“We just completed our seventh human spaceflight and the 25th flight for the New Shepard program. Our #NS25 astronaut crew included: Mason Angel, Sylvain Chiron, Ed Dwight, Ken Hess, Carol Schaller, and Gopi Thotakura. Thank you, astronauts”, said Blue Origin on X after the space flight.

We just completed our seventh human spaceflight and the 25th flight for the New Shepard program. Our #NS25 astronaut crew included: Mason Angel, Sylvain Chiron, Ed Dwight, Ken Hess, Carol Schaller, and Gopi Thotakura. Thank you, astronauts! Learn more: https://t.co/4a0UXRy6p6pic.twitter.com/kzL5GIQSql

— Blue Origin (@blueorigin) May 19, 2024

“I was the first guy in the world to be famous for not doing something. Needless to say, I’m overwhelmed”, said Dwight before the liftoff.

Dwight was a skilled test pilot when President John F. Kennedy reassigned him to a highly competitive Air Force program, which was considered a path to the astronaut corps. But in the end, he was not chosen.

“This is a life-changing experience, everybody needs to do this,” said Dwight after the 11-minute space flight.

“I thought I didn’t really need this in my life,” reflecting on his omission from the astronaut corps, which was his first experience with failure as a young man. “But I lied”, he added.

With inputs from IANS, AFP

Ed Dwight, who is the first Black man to be trained as an astronaut, is set to become the oldest person to go to space at 90 years of age. Dwight in 1961 hoped to become the first Black astronaut in space, but he never made it.

A Blue Origin flight is finally giving the 90-year-old the chance that he was denied decades ago.

On Sunday, Dwight will join five others on a space flight by Blue Origin, the space travel company owned by Amazon boss Jeff Bezos. The 11-minute flight will take the six members to the edge of space, helping them experience weightlessness due to zero gravity and view the Earth’s horizon.

In 1961, Dwight was selected by then US President John F. Kennedy to enter an Air Force training program, known as the Path to NASA’s Astronaut Corps. Dwight was an elite test pilot at that time, but was ultimately not picked.

In 2022, Dwight revealed that when he got the offer letter in 1961 to be the first Black astronaut, he thought “these dudes were crazy.”

After the completion of the program in 1963, the Air Force recommended him to join the corps. However, he wasn’t selected. In 1966, he resigned from the military citing strain of racial politics.

“So, all these White folks that I’m dealing with, I mean, my peers, the other guys that were astronaut candidates and the leadership was just horrified at the idea of my coming down to Edwards and the president appointing me to the position,” CBS quoted him as saying.

He dedicated the rest of his life to telling Black history through sculpture. Dwight’s art, displayed around the country, includes iconic figures like Martin Luther King Jr, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, and more.

Dwight’s seat on the Blue Origin flight is believed to cost $250,000 even though the ticket prices are a well-guarded secret. His ticket has been sponsored by the nonprofit organisation, Space for Humanity, known for providing help to send citizens to space.

Washington:

Blue Origin is set to fly adventurers to the final frontier on Sunday for the first time in nearly two years, reigniting competition in the space tourism market after a rocket mishap put its crewed operations on hold.

Six people including Black sculptor and former Air Force pilot Ed Dwight, who was controversially spurned by NASA’s astronaut corps in the 1960s, will blast off at around 8:30 am local time (1330 GMT) from the company’s Launch Site One base in west Texas.

Dwight — at 90 years, 8 months, and 10 days — is set to become the oldest person to go to space, narrowly pipping Star Trek actor William Shatner, who was almost two months younger when he launched with Blue Origin in 2021.

Mission NS-25 is the seventh human flight for the enterprise owned and founded by Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos, who sees short jaunts on the New Shepard suborbital vehicle as a stepping stone to greater ambitions, including the development of a full-fledged heavy rocket and lunar lander.

French entrepreneur Sylvain Chiron, one of the crew, told AFP he was most excited about “this sensation of leaving the world of men and seeing the Earth as a whole, from above, without borders, with all its fragility and beauty.”

To date, Blue Origin has flown 31 people aboard New Shepard — a small, fully reusable rocket system named after Alan Shepard, the first American in space.

Second nonagenarian

The program encountered a setback when a New Shepard rocket caught fire shortly after launch on September 12, 2022. The uncrewed capsule ejected in time, meaning astronauts would have been safe had they flown.

A federal investigation revealed an overheating engine nozzle was at fault. Blue Origin took corrective steps and carried out a successful uncrewed launch in December 2023, paving the way for Sunday’s mission.

After lift-off, the sleek and roomy capsule separates from the booster, which produces zero carbon emissions as its fuel — liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen — combust to produce water vapor. The rocket performs a precision vertical landing.

As the spaceship soars beyond the Karman Line, the internationally recognized boundary of space 62 miles (100 kilometers) above sea level, passengers can marvel at the Earth’s curvature and unbuckle their seats to float — or even perform jumping jacks — during a few minutes of weightlessness.

The capsule then reenters the atmosphere, deploying its parachutes for a gentle desert landing in a puff of sand.

Bezos himself was on the program’s first-ever crewed flight in 2021. A few months later, Shatner blurred the lines between science fiction and reality when he became the world’s oldest-ever astronaut, decades after he first played a space traveler.

Dwight will become only the second nonagenarian to venture beyond Earth.

Ticket prices are a well-guarded secret, but guests like Dwight — whose seat was sponsored by the nonprofit Space for Humanity — ride for free.

To space, finally

Blue Origin’s competitor in suborbital space is Virgin Galactic, which deploys a supersonic spaceplane that is dropped from beneath the wings of a massive carrier plane at high altitude.

Virgin Galactic experienced its own two-year safety pause because of an anomaly linked with the 2021 flight that carried its founder British tycoon Richard Branson into space. But the company later hit its stride with half a dozen successful flights in quick succession.

Its next mission is set for June, after which it will head into another pause to build out a new class of advanced spaceplane.

Sunday’s mission finally gives Dwight the chance he was denied decades ago.

He was an elite test pilot when he was appointed by president John F Kennedy to join a highly competitive Air Force program known as a pathway for the astronaut corps, but was ultimately not picked.

He left the military in 1966, citing the strain of racial politics, before dedicating his life to telling Black history through sculpture. His art, displayed around the country, includes iconic figures like Martin Luther King Jr, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, and more.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)