The countdown is on for an all-female crew, headlined by singer Katy Perry, to blast off to space on a Blue Origin rocket.
For the April 14 flight on New Shepard, Perry will be joined by journalist Gayle King, former NASA rocket scientist Aisha Bowe, bioastronautics research scientist and civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen, filmmaker Kerianne Flynn and journalist and helicopter pilot Lauren Sánchez, who is engaged to Blue Origin owner Jeff Bezos.
The all-female crew's mission to space will be the 11th manned spaceflight for New Shepard and the first all-female spaceflight crew since 1963, according to Blue Origin.
The flight will last only around 11 minutes and reach a height of about 65 miles above Earth. The Kármán line, considered the boundary between Earth's atmosphere and outer space, is 62 miles, so Perry and her fellow crew members will not actually be launched into orbit.
Here is a look at how the crew is preparing in the countdown to the launch.
In their first interview together as a crew, King told ELLE that she is preparing for the flight by learning to meditate, to help ease her anxiety.
"I'm starting to meditate. I tried it years ago, but one of these women said, 'I have the perfect person for you.' So he's coming to my house," Gayle told the outlet for its special April digital cover issue. "I have some sessions planned before we go up just to help me with [my anxiety]."
Bowe said that she "turned up the intensity" of her preparations in the final countdown to the launch.
"I just completed a NASTAR simulation, where I had the opportunity to actually experience what I can expect to encounter on the flight," Bowe told ELLE. "For me, the physical preparation is really important. I want to have my body know what it feels like to go up. We've got a fighter jet flight booked, and I'm really excited about that."
Katy Perry, Lauren Sanchez set to travel to space on Blue Origin rocketFlynn said she is utilizing zero-gravity simulation flights to get used to the feeling of weightlessness.
When the women reach space, they'll be able to float around the New Shepard rocket for several minutes.
"I've done several zero-gravity simulation flights. They carve out a Boeing 747 and fly the plane in a parabolic pattern, so when the plane descends, everyone floats up. That was to get used to the feeling of weightlessness," Flynn said. "So I think I'm going to have some fun with that when we're up. I also did the NASTAR training in Philadelphia and experienced up to 5 G's of pressure."
A few days before the April 14 launch, the New Shepard crew will gather at the launch site in Van Horn, Texas, for final training sessions.
Day one of the training is focused on getting the soon-to-be Blue Origin astronauts fitted in customized flight suits and acclimated to the capsule in which they will fly.
When Perry, King and their crewmates walk into a fully accurate representation test capsule in training, they'll see where they are sitting for the first time, with name tags and patches identifying their seats.
Blue Origin astronaut describes ride to spaceBlue Origin staffers then guide the crew through what the flight will feel like and sound like, noting everything from where the cameras are located inside the capsule to how to respond to ground control and where the oxygen masks are located.
"We want them to be incredibly comfortable with every little thing even to the point where they're going to know exactly where each of the cameras is inside of the vehicle, so they can plan out any photos that they want to take and get really ready for what that journey will look like as they go up," Blue Origin's Sarah Knights told "Good Morning America" in 2021, when "GMA" co-anchor Michael Strahan flew on New Shepard.
Each New Shepard passenger has a 3-pound weight limit on what they are allowed to bring to space.
King said she is choosing photographs to bring, along with a memento from her grandson, while Perry said she plans to bring something with life in it, "to remind us how precious the Earth is."
Bowe said she plans to bring the flag from Apollo 12, as well as plant samples from Winston-Salem State University's astrobotany lab and dehydrated conch chowder, the national dish of her native Bahamas.
For Nguyen, her trip to space will include shells from the island in Malaysia where her Vietnamese mother first sought asylum following the fall of Saigon, along with a handwritten note that says, "Never ever give up."
Sánchez said she plans to bring the stuffed animal mascot of her children's book, "The Fly Who Flew to Space," as well as a few personal items.
As they prepare for the flight of a lifetime, the New Shephard crew will also learn two important phrases to use if they feel unsafe or uncomfortable and want to get out of the flight.
According to Knights, those two phrases are "time-out" and "I will not fly."
Perry and the other Blue Origin astronauts have until T-minus 2 minutes and 30 seconds before liftoff to utter those words. After that, the vehicle controls itself and the Blue Origin team said it can be risky to stop the program.
The all-female crew of New Shepard said they plan to be glamorous in space and not be ashamed about it.
"I think it's so important for people to see us like that. This dichotomy of engineer and scientist, and then beauty and fashion. We contain multitudes. Women are multitudes," Nguyen told ELLE. "I'm going to be wearing lipstick."
Bowe said she took the hairstyle she plans to wear on the flight on a test run skydiving in Dubai, saying, "I also wanted to test out my hair and make sure that it was OK."
"Space is going to finally be glam," added Perry.
