On December 18 (Thursday), Jeff Bezos's aerospace company, Blue Origin, is scheduled to send a spacecraft carrying six astronauts on a suborbital journey. This historic flight will feature the first astronaut who is a "wheelchair user," along with an engineer who previously worked at SpaceX. The launch window is set to open at 11 a.m. Eastern Time (which corresponds to 0:00 Beijing Time on the following day). The rocket will take off from western Texas, and the entire flight is expected to last approximately 11 minutes. During this brief time, the astronauts will experience a few moments of weightlessness.

Among the crew members is Michaela Benthaus, an aerospace engineer at the European Space Agency. She was injured in a mountain biking accident in 2018. Another notable astronaut on board is Hans Koenigsmann, who spent two decades at SpaceX, serving as the Vice President of Avionics before retiring in 2021. This mission will be the 16th manned spaceflight conducted by Blue Origin using its "New Shepard" spacecraft.