The American company Blue Origin has put a person in a wheelchair as part of the crew of a suborbital flight for the first time. This is reported on the company's website. The New Shepard rocket is scheduled to launch from the Texas Launch Center on December 20. Five more participants will fly with European Space Agency engineer Michaela Benthaus, who suffered a spinal cord injury in 2018.
During the flight, the ship and its crew will cross the Karman line – the normal boundary of space at an altitude of 100 km – and return to Earth using a parachute system. Blue Origin was founded by entrepreneur Jeff Bezos and competes in the space tourism market with Virgin Galactic, where a ticket costs $600,000. In total, about 80 people flew on the New Shepard spacecraft.
In November, Blue Origin launched its New Glenn rocket an hour after it suddenly stopped at the last moment before its scheduled liftoff time. The rocket launch was originally scheduled for 14:57 local time (22:57 Moscow time), but the launch from Cape Canaveral in Florida was stopped at the last second. It took place just an hour later – at 15:55 (23:55 Moscow time).
