Jeff Bezos will be aboard for Blue Origin’s first human space flight next month.
In an Instagram post early Monday, Bezos said he, his brother, and the winner of an ongoing auction will be aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard spacecraft during its scheduled launch on July 20.
July 20 is the anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing. The trip will be a brief hop to space from Texas.
Bezos said in early February that he was stepping down as CEO of Amazon to spend more time focused on Blue Origin, the aerospace company he founded, among other things.
“To see the Earth from space, it changes you, changes your relationship with this planet. It’s one Earth,” Bezos said in the Instagram post.
“I want to go on this flight because it’s a thing I’ve wanted to do all my life. It’s an adventure. It’s a big deal for me.”
The auction for an open seat on New Shepard ends Saturday. The winning bid right now stands at $2.8 million US, with almost 6,000 participants from 143 countries.
The winning bid amount will be donated to Blue Origin’s foundation, Club for the Future, whose mission is to inspire future generations to pursue careers in STEM and to help invent the future of life in space.