If you missed it, last week the billionaire space race ended as Richard Branson graced the outer atmosphere of Earth on one of his Virgin Galactic flights. While ex-Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos may have missed being number one, that won’t stop him from trying to get in on that space action today.
Blue Origin, an aerospace manufacturer founded by Bezos, received approval for its space flight from the US Federal Aviation Administration last week.
The historic flight will see Bezos, his brother Mark, aviator Wally Frank and a high school graduate, Oliver Daemon, travel on Blue Origin’s New Shepherd suborbital rocket.
They’re expected to fly 100km above the Earth and cross the Kármán boundary line, which defines the start of space. Once there they’ll experience about 3 minutes of weightlessness before (unfortunately) heading on back to Earth.
If you’d like to see whether the weight of all of Bezos’ money can defy gravity then you’ll be glad to know there are ways you can tune in live from Australia.
How to watch Jeff Bezos go to space in Australia
The Blue Origin space flight is scheduled for Tuesday, July 20, 2021. The flight is expected to last around 11-minutes.
The pre-show broadcast will begin at 7:30 am EDT and lift-off is scheduled for 9 am EDT. In Australian time zones, this translates to:
- AEST: Broadcast starts at 9:30 pm, Take-off at 11 pm
- ACST: Broadcast starts at 9:00 pm, Take-off at 10:30 pm
- AWST: Broadcast starts at 7:30 pm, Take-off at 9 pm
Bear in mind these times may change depending on weather conditions and if there are any technical issues.
The rocket will launch from a remote location in the west Texas desert and will be closed to spectators, but you can watch it live and for free online.
Here are your options:
The other billionaire in this space race equation is of course Elon Musk, who has his own aerospace company with SpaceX.
However, it appears Musk got space envy when Branson rocketed up there earlier this week and has since booked a ticket for himself with Virgin Galactic rather than his own Space-X. Stay tuned for when you can watch that one.
If you’d like to check out Branson’s flight from earlier this week, you can do that here.