The New Shepard capsule launched at 9:00 am EST this morning and headed up 65 miles above ground. Bezos and three other passengers experienced about three minutes of weightlessness before heading back down to earth. The entire flight took about 11 minutes. You can watch the entire space flight via Blue Origin’s YouTube channel, as they captured the entire event on video. The video is over two hours long but if you are just looking to watch the flight, you can skip straight ahead to about an hour and 43 minutes in to get to the action. Bezos’ maiden voyage comes a little over a week after Virgin Galactic owner and billionaire Richard Branson flew into space on a test flight of the company’s spaceplane. After the flight, Branson said that his ultimate mission was “to turn the dream of space travel into a reality.” With Bezos and Branson both trying to make space travel achievable for the masses, it appears we have entered a new kind of space race that is between billionaires instead of governments. Of course, trips to space are expected to cost about a quarter-million dollars, so it may be a while before the common folk are actually able to make the voyage for a family vacation.
