‘Captain Kirk’ actor Shatner goes to space on Blue Origin rocket
Washington, Oct 13 (EFE).- Actor William Shatner, who played captain Kirk in Star Trek, on Wednesday became the oldest person to go to space.
The 90-year-old was blasted into space aboard the New Shepard rocket developed by Blue Origin, owned by US tycoon Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.
“What you have given me is the most profound experience. I’m so filled with emotion about what just happened. I hope I never recover from this,” he told Bezos after landing.
The Canadian actor cited Isaac Newton in a Twitter post afterwards: “I do not know what I may appear to the world. But to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me,” he added.
The rocket also transported two travelers who paid to go to space — Chris Boshuizen, co-founder of the Planet Labs nanosatellite company and Glen de Vries, co-founder of a clinical research platform.
They were joined by Audrey Powers, vice president of Blue Origin Missions and Flight Operations.
The New Shepard took off from west Texas at 14:50 GMT, one hour behind schedule.
They traveled inside a capsule on top of the rocket that reached an altitude of 100 km in a journey that lasted 10 minutes.
Once in space, the capsule detached itself from the rocket before safely descending.
This is Shatner’s first real life trip to space, after making several stellar journeys aboard the Enterprise in the series Star Trek, which aired its first episode in 1966 and lasted three seasons.
