Six civilian women, including American pop star KT, are heading to space on the 14th. This will be the first all-female exploration team to go to space since 1963, 62 years ago.
Private aerospace company Blue Origin, founded by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, announced it will launch the spacecraft New Shepard from Van Horn, Texas, at 9:30 a.m. (10:30 p.m. on the 14th, Korean time). This flight is the 11th crewed flight of New Shepard and its 31st mission.
The crew includes world-renowned singer KT, rocket scientist Aisha Bowe, civil rights activist and biocspace engineer Amanda Nguyen, CBS Morning host Gayle King, film producer Keriann Flynn, and Lauren Sánchez, the fiancée of Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos.
This flight is the first in which the crew is entirely women since Russian astronaut Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman to fly solo into space in 1963. Blue Origin stated, "We formed an all-female flight team to address the gender gap in spaceflight history and shed light on women's roles."
The passengers will depart from a launch site in West Texas and will fly in space for about 10 to 12 minutes. They are expected to experience weightlessness for approximately three minutes after crossing the Kármán line, the boundary between Earth and space, located about 100 km above the ground, before returning to Earth.