

The flight comes as the space tourism industry finally takes off, with passengers joyriding aboard ships built and operated by some of the richest men in the world. “William Shatner is setting the bar for what a 90-year-old man can do.” Shatner going into space is “the most badass thing I think I’ve ever seen,” said Joseph Barra, a bartender who helped cater the launch week festivities. Blue Origin said Shatner and the rest of the crew met all the medical and physical requirements, including the ability to hustle up and down several flights of steps at the launch tower. Passengers are subjected to nearly 6 G’s, or six times the force of Earth’s gravity, as the capsule descends.

… Am I going to be able to survive the G-forces?” “Everything is much more powerful,” he said. Shatner said the return to Earth was more jolting than his training led him to expect and made him wonder whether he was going to make it back alive. The covering of blue, this sheath, this blanket, this comforter of blue that we have around, we say, ‘Oh, that’s blue sky.’ And then suddenly you shoot through it all, and you’re looking into blackness, into black ugliness.” “To see the blue color whip by, and now you’re staring into blackness, that’s the thing. Everybody in the world needs to see,” he said. “Everybody in the world needs to do this. The actor said he was struck by the vulnerability of Earth and the relative sliver of its atmosphere. Shatner and the others wore close-fitting, flame-retardant, royal-blue flight suits, not exactly the tight, futuristic-for-the-’60s V-necks that the crew of the Enterprise had on TV. Welcome to Earth!” a jubilant Bezos said as he opened the hatch of the New Shepard capsule, named for first American in space, Alan Shepard. He was there to greet them when the capsule floated back to Earth under its brilliant blue-and-red parachutes.

Bezos said his mother had saved them for 48 years.īezos himself drove the four crew members to the launch pad, accompanied them to the platform high above the ground and cranked the hatch shut after they climbed aboard the 60-foot rocket.
#SAN JOSE SHARKS 3D LOGO FREE#
was racing for the moon, and went on to appear in a string of “Star Trek” movies.īezos is a huge “Star Trek” fan - the Amazon founder had a cameo as an alien in one of the later movies - and Shatner rode free as his invited guest.Īs a favor to Bezos, Shatner took up into space some “Star Trek” tricorders and communicators - sort of the iPhones of the future - that Bezos made when he was a 9-year-old Trekkie. Shatner starred in TV’s original “Star Trek” from 1966 to 1969, when the U.S. The flight brought priceless star power to Bezos’ space-tourism business, given its built-in appeal to baby boomers, celebrity watchers and space enthusiasts. NASA sent best wishes ahead of the flight, tweeting: “You are, and always shall be, our friend.” She said she, like so many others, was drawn to space by shows like “Star Trek.” James Tiberius Kirk go to space,” Blue Origin launch commentator Jacki Cortese said before liftoff. “This is a pinch-me moment for all of us to see Capt. The internet went wild, with Trekkies quoting favorite lines from Kirk, including, “Risk: Risk is our business.
#SAN JOSE SHARKS 3D LOGO TV#
Sci-fi fans reveled in the opportunity to see the man best known as the brave and principled commander of the starship Enterprise boldly go where no star of American TV has gone before. The flight included about three minutes of weightlessness and a view of the curvature of the Earth. Shatner became the oldest person in space, eclipsing the previous record - set by a passenger on a similar jaunt on a Bezos spaceship in July - by eight years. He said that going from the blue sky to the utter blackness of space was a moving experience: “In an instant you go, `Whoa, that’s death.’ That’s what I saw.”
