By Aliya Couillard, Staff Writer
On Monday April 14, six women were aboard a tourism rocket that launched for 11 minutes. This rocket and launch was conducted by the company Blue Origin. Blue Origin is a space technology private company. Jeff Bezos, the founder of amazon, owns the company, Blue Origin that provided the rocket for this experience.
Blue Origin was founded in 2000 by Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon. According to their website, the company was started to build “a road to space for the benefit of earth.” They back this as their goal by stating “We envision a future where millions of people will live and work in space with a single-minded purpose: to restore and sustain Earth, our blue origin.”
They then continue by stating their three mission objectives. The first is “Radically reduce the cost of access to space.” The second is “Harness the vast resources of space.” The third is “Inspire and mobilize future generations.”
It is a hefty price to board this rocket, with a required deposit of 150,000 dollars. The national average wage index is 66,622 dollars according to the Social Security AdministrationOne seat on the first flight in 2021 auctioned off for 28 million.
Graduate student James Dugan thinks that the price is fair when looking at what goes into making this attraction possible.
“The price does seem outrageous, but knowing how much it costs to build a rocket, the cost of fuel, I do think it is a reasonable price for the demographic that went.” He then continues by specifying that the price will attract mainly the upper class, “the price isn’t something that most people are willing to pay.”
Graduate Student Lauren Russell believes that it was wasteful to fund this project. She shares sentiments with a lot of people reacting to this, thinking the money would be of better use elsewhere.
“This money could have been put towards many things including ways to recycle more efficiently, expand green energy, and work on waste removal. There are just so much more meaningful things that could have been done,” she said.
Now, thinking about the second mission statement of Blue origin, harnessing resources from space. While looking at the rocket that was launched on April 14, we see that this launch does not deal with their wants to harness resources. As well as looking at the same launch of the same rocket occurring for the first time in July 2021. The passengers in the first trip to space included founder Jeff Bezos, Mark Bezos, Wally Funk and Oliver Daemen. The recent launch took pop star Katy Perry, Gayle King, NASA rocket scientist Aisha Bowe , bioastronautics researcher Amanda Nguyen, filmmaker Kerianne Flynn, and journalist Lauren Sánchez. Both of these missions took the rocket up 62 miles between outer space and Earth’s atmosphere.
Russell believes that this experience did not provide any importance. She is furthering her point mentioned prior, how putting this money and energy towards something else could be more helpful.
“I think this was honestly pointless. There was no need for it to happen, and while yes two women do have backgrounds on astronomy, they were not highlighted at all. They kept saying how empowering it was…but it would have been if they sent women who have worked their whole lives to go on a mission,” she said
Now we look to their third and final mission statement, inspiring younger generations. The company, Bezos, and the women on board, are receiving backlash from many people and news organizations. Companies such as Wendy’s posting “can we send her back,” about Katy Perry, and other people of influence such as Emily Ratajowski where she posted a video stating, “This is beyond parody, that you are about Mother Earth and its about Mother Earth, and you’re going up in a spaceship that is built and Parsi for by a company that’s single-handedly destroying the plant?”
This sentiment is shared by many in the public as they continue to comment on it. Dugan states “The money spent on this could be put towards world hunger, poverty, the housing crisis, and so many other things. I think there are more important issues here on earth than taking a quick trip to space.”
Russell also shares these sentiments with a majority of the public. Through the news and internet it is seen how the people have been reacting.
“I feel it wasn’t done right. They could have sent women in the field, but they used celebrities to get publicity. The whole thing felt off and just for the media. Also they were all dolled up to look picture perfect, but when an actual female astronaut comes back to earth she gets picked apart,” she said.
However, the women who went, see their trip in a different light. With their motto in space being “Take up space”. Aisha Bowe, the NASA rocket scientist stated that they “advanced science…more people are going to be able to do meaningful research with Blue Origin because we collected data… we are inspiring the world right now.” While Gayle King stated “I know there are some haters, but I’m not going to let people steal my joy, and steal the joy of what we did or what we accomplished that day.” However it has recently been reported that Katy Perry, suppodley regrets the spectacle she made of the Blue Origin space mission; not going on the mission, but the way she acted publicly.
Overall, this tourism rocket has brought many conversations to the table. They can be seen throughout the news, different social medias, and in in person discussions.
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