Katy Perry, Gayle King and Lauren Sanchez were among the passengers of Blue Origin’s 31st mission and 11th human spaceflight, taking the total number of people the company has flown to space to 58.

Virgin Galactic has confirmed plans to launch its next spaceflight, ‘Galactic 06’, on or around 26 January 2024. The upcoming spaceflight comes after the listed company successfully operated six suborbital flights in six months this year, the latest being in early November which carried three customers, only one of which was a private astronaut.

Virgin Galactic has revealed plans to move forward with a new astronaut campus and training facility after acquiring a parcel of land for the project in New Mexico.

Fifteen years after purchasing his ticket to space with Virgin Galactic, Matthew Upchurch, the CEO of Virtuoso, remains steadfastly committed to Richard Branson’s space tourism project.

Virgin Galactic’s first fully crewed space flight on Sunday (US time) grabbed the media spotlight in the past week, but rival commercial space tourism enterprise Blue Origin will have bragging rights of its own next week.