Meet the people who joined Jeff Bezos on his spaceflight

Three lucky passengers will join Amazon founder Jeff Bezos Tuesday on Blue Origin’s first commercial flight.

Evidence for the 11-minute trip to the edge of space includes the billionaire’s brother, Mark Bezos, pioneering pilot Wally Funk and Oliver Daemen, a wealthy teenager from the Netherlands.

The Light Crew will be aboard the space tourism company’s New Shepard rocket, which is set to explode at about 9 a.m. ET from Van Horn, Texas.

Here’s what you need to know about the upcoming astronauts:

Financier Mark Bezos

Mark, 51, is the younger brother of the founder of Amazon six years ago. The couple are “best friends”, Jeff said in an Instagram video Last month, he surprised Mark with an invitation to space.

“Since I was 5 years old, I have dreamed of traveling into space. On July 20th, I will be taking that journey with my brother. Greatest adventure, with my best friend,” Jeff posted.

The young Bezos was also successful in business, starting with marketing, working as an advertising executive before founding a New York-based private equity firm. High investment capital in 2019.

In addition, Mark is the director of the Bezos Family Foundation and an executive at Robin Hood, an anti-poverty nonprofit also based in New York.

He also served as a volunteer firefighter with the Scarsdale Fire Department in Westchester County for over a decade.

Trailblazer Wally Funk

At the age of 82, Funk will become the oldest astronaut ever, fulfilling an age-old ambition thwarted by sexism in the 1960s.

22 year old New Mexican native when she was on Mercury 13, a group of intrepid women who went through the same training as NASA’s male astronauts in 1961.

But the program was unsuccessful and the women were never allowed to go to space.

In one Instagram post announced that Funk would be joining the mission, Bezos wrote that “Nobody waited any longer,” adding: “The time has come.”

Funk, who learned to fly for the first time at the age of 9, is still breaking barriers in the aviation industry – becoming the first female Federal Aviation Administration inspector and the first female aviation safety investigator. National Traffic Safety Board.

Asked by Bezos what she would say after touching earth, the pioneering Nigerian doctorate replied, “I would say, ‘Honey, that’s the best thing that ever happened to me’ and hug you! “

Dutch teen Oliver Daemen

Daemen, 18, is made history as the youngest astronaut. He was also Blue Origin’s first paying customer, after his father, founder and chief executive officer of a private equity firm, bought him a ticket, according to CNBC.

Teens are replacing anonymous winners in a $28 million public auction, who had to bow off the first flight chuyến “Due to scheduling conflicts”, and will make the trip later.

Daemen’s father, Joes Daemen is another auctioneer in last month’s auction for the location, but dropped out when bids started to skyrocket. It is unknown how much he spent on his son’s ticket.

Young Daemen took a year off after graduating from high school last year to get his private pilot’s license. He is due to attend Utrecht University in the Netherlands in September to study physics and innovation management.

Blue Origin says the mission will “fulfil a lifelong dream” for Daemen, a longtime aviation and space enthusiast.

It seems the teenager is also a fan of water sports: He posted several photos of himself snorkeling, surfing and windsurfing on Instagram over the years.

“I’m super excited to go into space,” Daemen said in a video posted on social media. “I’ve dreamed of this all my life.”