London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Friday, Aug 22, 2025

"Not Really Nervous": Billionaire Jeff Bezos Girds For Inaugural Space Flight

"Not Really Nervous": Billionaire Jeff Bezos Girds For Inaugural Space Flight

The world's richest person and three crewmates are due to fly from a desert site in West Texas on an 11-minute trip to the edge of space aboard Blue Origin's New Shepard.
American billionaire businessman Jeff Bezos said on Monday he is excited and curious but not very nervous on the eve of taking part in his company Blue Origin's inaugural suborbital flight alongside the oldest and youngest people ever bound for space.

The world's richest person and three crewmates are due to fly from a desert site in West Texas on an 11-minute trip to the edge of space aboard Blue Origin's New Shepard, a 60-foot-tall (18.3 meters) and fully autonomous rocket-and-capsule combo. The flight represents an important milestone in the establishment of the space tourism industry.

Bezos did a round of televised interviews ahead of the launch, set for around 8 a.m. CDT (1300 GMT) from Blue Origin's Launch Site One facility some 20 miles (32 km) outside the rural Texas town of Van Horn.

"People keep asking if I'm nervous. I'm not really nervous, I'm excited. I'm curious. I want to know what we're going to learn," Bezos, founder of Amazon.com Inc, told the "CBS This Morning" program.

"We've been training. This vehicle is ready. This crew is ready. This team is amazing," Bezos said. "We just feel really good about it."

Bezos and his brother Mark Bezos will be joined in the all-civilian crew by 82-year-old pioneering female aviator Wally Funk and 18-year-old Oliver Daemen, a recent high school graduate set to attend the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands to study physics and innovation management in September.

Daemen is the company's first paying customer. His father heads investment management firm Somerset Capital Partners.

The flight comes nine days after rival Richard Branson, the British billionaire businessman, was aboard his company Virgin Galactic's rocket plane for its pioneering suborbital flight from New Mexico.

Bezos sought to downplay any rivalry with Branson.

"There's one person who was the first person in space. His name was Yuri Gagarin. And that happened a long time ago," Bezos said on the NBC's program "Today," referring to the Soviet cosmonaut who reached space in 1961.

"I think I'm going to be number 570 or something. That's where we're going to be in this list. So this isn't a competition. This is about building a road to space so that future generations can do incredible things in space," Bezos said.

Funk was one of the so-called Mercury 13 group of women who trained to become astronauts for the first U.S. human spaceflight program in the early 1960s. She passed the same rigorous testing as the Mercury Seven male astronauts in NASA's space program, though the women were denied the chance to become astronauts because of their gender.

"Back when Wally was part of the Mercury 13, all the testing that she did, she outperformed all of the men," Bezos said on "Today." "And we can confirm at 82 years old, she can still outperform all of the men. We've been doing the training with Wally. She can outrun all of us."
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
After 200,000 Orders in 2 Minutes: Xiaomi Accelerates Marketing in Europe
Ukraine Declares De Facto War on Hungary and Slovakia with Terror Drone Strikes on Their Gas Lifeline
Animated K-pop Musical ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ Becomes Netflix’s Most-Watched Original Animated Film
New York Appeals Court Voids Nearly $500 Million Civil Fraud Penalty Against Trump While Upholding Fraud Liability
Elon Musk tweeted, “Europe is dying”
Far-Right Activist Convicted of Incitement Changes Gender and Demands: "Send Me to a Women’s Prison" | The Storm in Germany
Hungary Criticizes Ukraine: "Violating Our Sovereignty"
Will this be the first country to return to negative interest rates?
Child-free hotels spark controversy
North Korea is where this 95-year-old wants to die. South Korea won’t let him go. Is this our ally or a human rights enemy?
Hong Kong Launches Regulatory Regime and Trials for HKD-Backed Stablecoins
China rehearses September 3 Victory Day parade as imagery points to ‘loyal wingman’ FH-97 family presence
Trump Called Viktor Orbán: "Why Are You Using the Veto"
Horror in the Skies: Plane Engine Exploded, Passengers Sent Farewell Messages
MSNBC Rebrands as MS NOW Amid Comcast’s Cable Spin-Off
AI in Policing: Draft One Helps Speed Up Reports but Raises Legal and Ethical Concerns
Shame in Norway: Crown Princess’s Son Accused of Four Rapes
Apple Begins Simultaneous iPhone 17 Production in India and China
A Robot to Give Birth: The Chinese Announcement That Shakes the World
Finnish MP Dies by Suicide in Parliament Building
Outrage in the Tennis World After Jannik Sinner’s Withdrawal Storm
William and Kate Are Moving House – and the New Neighbors Were Evicted
Class Action Lawsuit Against Volkswagen: Steering Wheel Switches Cause Accidents
Taylor Swift on the Way to the Super Bowl? All the Clues Stirring Up Fans
Dogfights in the Skies: Airbus on Track to Overtake Boeing and Claim Aviation Supremacy
Tim Cook Promises an AI Revolution at Apple: "One of the Most Significant Technologies of Our Generation"
Apple Expands Social Media Presence in China With RedNote Account Ahead of iPhone 17 Launch
Are AI Data Centres the Infrastructure of the Future or the Next Crisis?
Cambridge Dictionary Adds 'Skibidi,' 'Delulu,' and 'Tradwife' Amid Surge of Online Slang
Bill Barr Testifies No Evidence Implicated Trump in Epstein Case; DOJ Set to Release Records
Zelenskyy Returns to White House Flanked by European Allies as Trump Pressures Land-Swap Deal with Putin
The CEO Who Replaced 80% of Employees for the AI Revolution: "I Would Do It Again"
Emails Worth Billions: How Airlines Generate Huge Profits
Character.ai Bets on Future of AI Companionship
China Ramps Up Tax Crackdown on Overseas Investments
Japanese Office Furniture Maker Expands into Bomb Shelter Market
Intel Shares Surge on Possible U.S. Government Investment
Hurricane Erin Threatens U.S. East Coast with Dangerous Surf
EU Blocks Trade Statement Over Digital Rule Dispute
EU Sends Record Aid as Spain Battles Wildfires
JPMorgan Plans New Canary Wharf Tower
Zelenskyy and his allies say they will press Trump on security guarantees
Beijing is moving into gold and other assets, diversifying away from the dollar
Escalating Clashes in Serbia as Anti-Government Protests Spread Nationwide
The Drought in Britain and the Strange Request from the Government to Delete Old Emails
Category 5 Hurricane in the Caribbean: 'Catastrophic Storm' with Winds of 255 km/h
"No, Thanks": The Mathematical Genius Who Turned Down 1.5 Billion Dollars from Zuckerberg
The surprising hero, the ugly incident, and the criticism despite victory: "Liverpool’s defense exposed in full"
Digital Humans Move Beyond Sci-Fi: From Virtual DJs to AI Customer Agents
YouTube will start using AI to guess your age. If it’s wrong, you’ll have to prove it
×