German woman becomes the first person with paralysis to fly into space
21 December 04:05
European Space Agency engineer Michaela Benthouse joined a short space mission organized by the American commercial company Blue Origin. On Saturday, December 20, the woman went on a suborbital flight for 11 minutes on the New Shepard spacecraft, "Komersant Ukrainian" reports citing DW.
It is noteworthy that the 33-year-old native of the German city of Kiel became the first person in space to be paralyzed from the waist down. Benthaus was injured in 2018 after falling off her bicycle. Since then, she has been using a wheelchair.
“Honestly, it was the coolest experience of my life,” Benthouse said shortly after landing. – “I think you should never give up on your dreams. There is always a small chance that they will come true.”
According to the woman, she has been fascinated by space since early childhood, after watching the Star Wars movie.
Blue Origin has sent a ship into space for the 16th time
The New Shepard crew, in addition to Benthouse, includes 5 people, including another German, aerospace engineer Hans Koenigsmann. Until 2021, he worked as an engineer for Blue Origin’s competitor, billionaire Elon Musk’s SpaceX.
“The view of the Earth and its atmosphere is fantastic, but the black background was more saturated than I thought,” Koenigsmann said after landing.
The mission itself was the 16th manned flight of the space tour company Blue Origin, owned by American billionaire Jeff Bezos. According to the company, about 80 wealthy clients, including American celebrities, have taken part in space express flights over the past few years. The exact ticket prices are not disclosed.
SpaceX sends tourists to the ISS
Some critics do not consider flights on New Shepard to be full-fledged space flights, as the reusable ship only rises to suborbital altitudes. At the same time, Blue Origin’s competitor and the leading space company in the United States, SpaceX, together with Axiom Space, has launched tourist missions to the International Space Station (ISS).
In July, the fourth commercial flight to the ISS was successfully completed. Four space tourists took part in the mission, all of whom were affiliated with companies working in this field. The tourists spent more than two weeks on board the ISS, after which the Crew Dragon reusable manned spacecraft capsule with them landed off the coast of California.
