The year 2021 will be an unforgettable moment for Jeff Bezos and 4 US civilians. Because this year they successfully traveled to outer space.
Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson successfully fulfilled his mission to reach space in July 2021. He flew into space on his own rocket ship Spaceport America in New Mexico a few months ago. The three Virgin Galactic employees accompanying Branson are Chief Astronaut Instructor Beth Moses, Lead Operations Engineer Colin Bennett, and Vice President of Government Affairs and Research Operations Sirisha Bandla.
Not only Richard Branson, one of the world's richest people, Jeff Bezos also successfully traveled to space this year. Bezos' flight launched just nine days after entrepreneur Richard Branson blasted off into space on a Virgin Galactic rocket.
As is known, the conglomerate founder of Amazon managed to fulfill its mission to fly into space on a Blue Origin rocket. Bezos traveled to space along with 3 other people, namely his brother Mark Bezos, 82-year-old female pilot Wally Funk and the last, Oliver Daemen.
Wally Funk is not new to the world of aviation. He is an 82-year-old pilot and aviation pioneer. It is known, he had to wait 60 years to be able to reach outer space. Previously, when she was 21 years old, Funk was one of the participants in the female astronaut training program, Woman in Space. Unfortunately, Funk's dream had to run aground. Now he is smiling widely and has reached his dream. Wally Funk is also known as one of the oldest people to have flown into space.
While Wally Funk is known as one of the oldest people to have flown into space, Oliver Daeman is known as the youngest person to ever fly into space. The 18-year-old went on a trip into space with Jeff Bezos and Wally Funk. Behind the flight of Daemen into space, there is a big contribution from his father named Joes Daemen. Joes is the Founder and CEO of Somerset Capital Partners, an investment firm based in the Netherlands. The overseas tour seat Oliver Daemen was paid for by his father, Joes, at a $37.7 million charity auction.
Star Trek's Captain Kirk, William Shatner, has also successfully traveled to space at the age of 90. The New Shepard mission to take William Shatner into space is called NS-18. This mission is Blue Origin's fifth New Shepard rocket launch this year.
It was Space X's turn to successfully fly the Inspiration4 mission which took 4 civilians into space. SpaceX successfully flew the Inspiration4 mission which took 4 civilians into space. They flew from NASA's runway facility at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida on Thursday (16/9/2021) at 20:03 local time. This flight made history because all of its passengers were civilians who were not trained to become NASA astronauts. The flight was funded by the founder and CEO of technology company Shift4 Payments Jared Isaacman (second from right).
Next is Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa who also doesn't want to miss feeling the sensation of traveling to outer space in 2021. Yusaku spent 12 days on the International Space Station before returning to Earth on Monday (20/12). He and his assistant Yozo Hiranu became the first private Japanese citizens to visit outer space since journalist Toyohiro Akiyama traveled to Mir Station in 1990.
Before traveling to space, the Japanese billionaire made preparations at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Russia.
Not to forget, Russia also flew an actress and director into space this year. They are known to be making the first film in space orbit.
Led by veteran cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov, the Russian crew launched the Soyuz MS-19 spacecraft on a 12-day mission aboard the International Space Station (ISS) to shoot scenes from the film 'The Challenge'. They also returned to earth last October.
