Home
Science
Science News
Blue Origin Delays Next Space Launch Until March 29, SNL Star Pete Davidson Won’t Join Flight

Blue Origin Delays Next Space Launch Until March 29, SNL Star Pete Davidson Won’t Join Flight

With "Davidson no longer able to join" the new flight, Blue Origin said it would announce the sixth crew member "in the coming days."

By Reuters | Updated: 18 March 2022 13:43 IST

Blue Origin Delays Next Space Launch Until March 29, SNL Star Pete Davidson Won’t Join Flight

Photo Credit: Blue Origin

Blue Origin will announce the sixth crew member in the coming days

Click Here to Add Gadgets360 As A Trusted Source

Highlights

The flight was initially set for March 23
Bezos tagged along himself on Blue Origin's inaugural crewed flight
Blue Origin gave no immediate explanation for Davidson's withdrawal

Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin space tourism service has postponed until March 29 a flight initially set for next week, while Saturday Night Live comic Pete Davidson will not be a passenger on the launch, the company said on Thursday.

The company, in a brief notice first posted on Twitter, gave no immediate explanation for the change or Davidson's withdrawal from the manifest of Blue Origin's fourth commercial flight since last summer.

Davidson, 28, the boyfriend of reality TV star and socialite Kim Kardashian, had just been officially named on Monday as Blue Origin's honorary guest to join five paying customers on the flight initially set for March 23.

Meghan Markle to Launch Her First Spotify Podcast This Summer

With Davidson no longer able to join the new flight, Blue Origin said it would announce the sixth crew member in the coming days.

The five previously revealed are angel investor Marty Allen, real estate veteran Marc Hagle and his wife Sharon Hagle, University of North Carolina professor Jim Kitchen and George Nield, founder and president of Commercial Space Technologies.

Like the first three groups of Blue Origin passengers, they will ride to the edge on a six-story-tall, fully autonomous spacecraft called the New Shepard, which will lift off from Blue Origin's launch site near the rural west Texas town of Van Horn.

Elon Musk’s ‘Combat Challenge’ to Vladimir Putin Prompts Mockery in Russia

The suborbital joyride, lasting about 10 minutes from liftoff to touchdown, will ascend to about 350,000 feet (106km), treating passengers to a few moments of weightlessness, before a descent back to Earth for a parachute landing.

Bezos, the billionaire founder of online retail giant Amazon tagged along himself on Blue Origin's inaugural crewed flight to space last July.

He accompanied his brother, Mark Bezos, trailblazing octogenarian female aviator Wally Funk and an 18-year-old Dutch high school graduate.

Later passengers included 90-year-old Star Trek actor William Shatner, who became the oldest person to fly to space, Good Morning America co-host Michael Strahan, and the eldest daughter of pioneering astronaut Alan Shepard, after whom Blue Origin's spacecraft is named.

This week on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast, we dive into Apple's Peek Performance event. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.

Affiliate links may be automatically generated - see our ethics statement for details.

Comments

Get your daily dose of tech news, reviews, and insights, in under 80 characters on Gadgets 360 Turbo. Connect with fellow tech lovers on our Forum. Follow us on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News for instant updates. Catch all the action on our YouTube channel.