After a hell of a lot of anticipation, the Blue Origin celebrity flight into space has safely landed.
At around 12:30am Tuesday (local time), an all-female crew of were catapulted into space via Jeff Bezos‘ Blue Origin New Shepard Spacecraft. It was the first all-female spaceflight since 1963.
The team of newly minted astronauts included pop star Katy Perry, TV presenter Gayle King, rocket scientist Aisha Bowe, filmmaker Kerianne Flynn, civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen and journalist Lauren Sanchez, who is also Bezos’ fiancée. Why, you might ask? IDK, Vibes, probably.
After being launched into the atmosphere, the celebs spent four minutes in zero gravity, bobbing around and enjoying the once-in-a-lifetime view.
Bezos’ angels spent a total of four minutes in zero gravity. While it’s a very, very short amount of time for something taking up so much oxygen, the group can officially say that they’ve been to space as the spaceship crossed the Karman Line, a boundary 100km above the ground, which is considered to be the level which separates the Earth’s atmosphere from space.
Just 11 minutes after takeoff, the dream team were safely back on the ground.
The entire spectacle — from the lead-up to take off to touch down — was broadcast in a two-hour livestream. Once the celebs landed back down on earth, the whole thing was considered a major success, opening the doors for future space tourism.
Well, in Bezos’ eyes. Ultimately, the whole thing is low-key vapid and kind of pointless, if you ask me.
Throughout the expedition, Katy was urged to sing by her fellow astronauts.
“We’d been asking her to sing all the time, and she wouldn’t. And the best part was when we got back in our seats after zero G, Katy sang What a Wonderful World,” Gayle said.
Katy said that she chose the beloved track rather than one of her own songs because the moment was not about her, “it’s about us”.
“I feel super connected to love. I think this experience has shown me you never know how much love you have to give, and how loved you are,” Katy said, moments after leaving the space capsule and kissing the ground.
low key bet they all felt like a plastic bag drifting through the wind in that thing#BlueOriginpic.twitter.com/PVIfKGwzei
— T (@teewatterss) April 14, 2025
As the spacecraft was launched into the air, the loved ones of the celebrities waited patiently (and nervously) on the ground below. When it landed, they were naturally very relieved, with Gayle’s best friend Oprah Winfrey bursting into tears.
“I’ve never been more proud of my friend than today, because this is bigger than just going to space,” Oprah said.
“For her, who, anytime we’re on a flight she’s in anybody’s lap if there’s the slightest bit of turbulence, has real, real, real anxiety flying, this is overcoming a wall of fear, a barrier, I think this is going to be cathartic in so many ways for her. None of us will ever forget this day.”
Meanwhile, Gayle was incredibly proud of herself for fighting her fears.
“Well, I stepped way out of my comfort zone. I might now get my ears pierced. I’ve always been afraid of that,” she said.
Gayle rethinking all her life choices… #BlueOrigin pic.twitter.com/REo29tHOBK
— Gibson Johns (@gibsonoma) April 14, 2025
While the expedition was an all-around success, back in 2021 there was some speculation over the safety of the Blue Origin spaceship after a group of 21 current and former Blue Origin employees told Business Insider that they wouldn’t feel safe riding the company’s rockets.
“In the opinion of an engineer who has signed on to this essay, Blue Origin has been lucky that nothing has happened so far. Many of this essay’s authors say they would not fly on a Blue Origin vehicle,” read the whistleblowing letter.
In response, Blue Origin stated that “New Shepard is the safest space vehicle ever designed or built”.
The latest space flight is the 11th human flight for Bezos’ company since it began taking passengers to space in 2021.
