Worlds richest man Jeff Bezos set to blast into space - all you need to know

World's richest man Jeff Bezos will today be blasted into space in a mission he hopes will pave the way for tourists to explore the galaxy.

The 57-year-old Amazon founder will take part in his company Blue Origin's first suborbital flight - alongside the oldest and youngest people ever bound for space.

He will go into orbit with his brother Mark, 53, 18-year-old physics student Oliver Daemon and pilot Wally Funk, 82.

Bezos and his three crewmates are due to fly from a desert site in West Texas on an 11-minute trip aboard Blue Origin's New Shepard, a 60-foot-tall (18.3 meters).

A livestream of the historic mission will begin at 12.30pm UK time.

He follows billionaire Richard Branson, who travelled to the edge of space in a Virgin Galactic rocket plane earlier this month.

"I am excited, but not anxious. We'll see how I feel when I'm strapped into my seat," Bezos said in an interview with Fox Business Network yesterday.

"We're ready. The vehicle's ready. This team is amazing. I feel very good about it. And I think my fellow crewmates feel good about it, too."

We'll be following the historic mission below - scroll down for live updates

10:27Dave BurkeBlue Origin flight will go further into space than Richard Branson's mission

Jeff Bezos and his crew will fly further out into space than Richard Branson did earlier this month.

The Blue Origin mission will reach 62 miles, nine miles more than Branson's Virgin Galactic flight.

In its mission statement Blue Origin says: "We are not in a race, and there will be many players in this human endeavor to go to space to benefit Earth. Blue's part in this journey is building a road to space with our reusable launch vehicles, so our children can build the future.

"We will go about this step by step because it is an illusion that skipping steps gets us there faster. Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast."

(Blue Origin/REX/Shutterstock)10:12Dave BurkeTeenager to become youngest ever in space as dad pays for place on Jeff Bezos rocket

The teenage son of a super-rich investment firm boss will today become the youngest person ever to go into space.

Oliver Daemen will join the four-member all-civilian crew as he becomes Blue Origin's first paying customer.

Daemen is working to obtain his pilot's license and is set to attend the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands to study physics and innovation management in September, Blue Origin said.

His father is Somerset Capital Partners CEO and founder Joes Daemen.

The elder Daemen "paid for the seat and chose to fly Oliver," Blue Origin said. The company declined to say how much was paid.

Oliver Daemen will join the Amazon founder, his brother Mark, and pilot Wally Funk when they launch into space aboard the New Shepard rocket. (Twitter: Blue Origin)10:04Dave BurkeNASA astronaut who was passed over because of her gender to become oldest person ever in space

Wally Funk, one of the 13 women who passed NASA's astronaut training program in the 1960s, will today become the oldest person ever to go into space at the age of 82.

"I didn't think I'd ever get to go up," Funk said in a video interview posted on Blue Origin's website.

Funk, then a 21-year-old pilot, was the youngest of the 13 women who passed the same rigorous testing as the Mercury Seven male astronauts in NASA's program that first sent Americans into space between 1961 and 1963, but were denied the chance to become astronauts themselves because of their gender.

She was the first female flight instructor at a U.S. military base and the first woman to become an air safety investigator for the National Transportation Safety Board.

(REUTERS)09:46Dave BurkeJeff Bezos 'excited' and 'curious' ahead of Blue Origin's first space flight

Jeff Bezos said he is excited and curious but not very nervous ahead of his company Blue Origin's first suborbital flight alongside the oldest and youngest people ever bound for space.

The world's richest person and three crewmates are due to fly from a desert site in West Texas on an 11-minute trip to the edge of space aboard Blue Origin's New Shepard, a 60-foot-tall and fully autonomous rocket-and-capsule combo.

The flight represents an important milestone in the establishment of the space tourism industry.

Bezos did a round of televised interviews ahead of the launch, set for around 1pm UK time from Blue Origin's Launch Site One facility some 20 miles (32 km) outside the rural Texas town of Van Horn.

"People keep asking if I'm nervous. I'm not really nervous, I'm excited. I'm curious. I want to know what we're going to learn," Bezos, told the "CBS This Morning" program.

"We've been training. This vehicle is ready. This crew is ready.

"This team is amazing," Bezos said. "We just feel really good about it."

(REUTERS)

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