Blue Origin has announced that Laura Shepard-Churchley, the chairman of the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation‘s board of trustees and eldest daughter of Alan Shepard, will be part of a six-person crew set to take off on Dec. 9.
Alan Shepard was the first American to travel into space. (Shepard-Churchley’s bio for the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation claims he was the first person to hit a golf ball on the surface of the moon, too, which might be cooler.) Blue Origin says the New Shepard 19 rocket taking this six-person crew into space on Dec. 9 was named after him.
The five other crew members are set to be Good Morning America co-anchor Michael Strahan,”space industry executive and philanthropist Dylan Taylor, investor Evan Dick, Bess Ventures founder Lane Bess, and Cameron Bess.” Blue Origin notes that “Lane and Cameron Bess will become the first parent-child pair to fly in space.”
Blue Origin’s first manned flight took place in July; its second launched in October. The company says that NS-19 will be its third manned flight of the year, and the first to feature a full six-person crew. The rocket will also be used to take “a postcard from each astronaut flown on behalf of Blue Origin’s foundation, Club for the Future, whose mission is to help future generations pursue careers in STEM and help invent the future of life in space.”
NS-19 is scheduled to take off on 10:00 a.m. ET / 15:00 UTC from Launch Site One in West Texas on Dec. 9. Blue Origin says that live coverage of the launch is supposed to start roughly 90 minutes before the scheduled takeoff.
