By Enyichukwu Enemanna
An all-woman crew, which included American pop star Katy Perry, is back on Earth after reaching space aboard a rocket vessel from Blue Origin, the space company owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.
“The highest high. It is a surrender to the unknown,” Perry said after landing back on Earth.
Perry said she really enjoyed the flight, adding: “I couldn’t recommend this experience more.”
Asked if she would record a song about her experience, she said “100%” and that she feels “really connected to that strong, divine feminine right now”.
It was the first all-female crewed expedition since a solo Soviet mission in 1963 by Valentina Tereshkova.
The 11-minute flight passed the so-called Kármán line – the internationally recognised altitude where space begins, more than 100 kilometres (60 miles) above the Earth’s surface.
The six women on board were Perry, broadcaster Gayle King, journalist Lauren Sánchez, rocket scientist Aisha Bowe, civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen, and film producer Kerianne Flynn.
Their fully automated craft rose vertically before the crew capsule detached mid-flight, later falling back to the ground slowed by parachutes and a retro rocket.
It was also the 11th sub-orbital crewed operation by Blue Origin, which has offered space tourism experiences for several years.
The company does not publicly disclose the price of trips made possible by its New Shepard rocket.
According to AFP, there was a brief period when the women could unbuckle from their seats and float in zero gravity.
Sharing the inspiration behind the expedition, Perry recently told Elle magazine that she was taking part “for my daughter Daisy,” whom she shares with actor Orlando Bloom, “to inspire her to never have limits on her dreams.”
“I’m just so excited to see the inspiration through her eyes and the light in her eyes when she sees that rocket go, and she goes back to school the next day and says ‘Mum went to space’,” Perry added.
She said in a separate video posted to Instagram that she was shocked to discover during space training that the capsule she would travel in was named the “Tortoise” and decorated with a “feather” design — the two nicknames her parents have for her.
“There are no coincidences and I’m just so grateful for these confirmations and so grateful that I feel like something bigger than me is steering the ship,” Perry said in the video.
They follow 52 previous Blue Origin passengers, including longtime Star Trek leading man William Shatner.
Such high-profile guests are intended to keep public interest in Blue Origin’s work alive, as it battles multiple rival firms in the space tourism field.
Bezos’ top challenger in passenger flights is Virgin Galactic, which offers a similar sub-orbital experience.
But Blue Origin aims in future to bring space tourists into orbit, competing directly with Elon Musk’s SpaceX.
