Blue Origin is set to launch its 15th space tourism mission on Wednesday. CBS News space analyst Bill Harwood joins with more details.

Cape Canaveral

Blue Origin is preparing to launch its 15th space tourism mission, carrying six people into space. Among the crew are the first female flyer from Kazakhstan, a Ukrainian entrepreneur, and Dr. Clint Kelly, who is making his second trip with Blue Origin. One crew member has chosen to remain unnamed until after the flight. 

The mission highlights the growing interest in commercial space travel, though the high cost of tickets—estimated at over half a million dollars—limits accessibility to wealthy individuals. The launch occurs as NASA faces proposed budget cuts that could impact scientific programs, though the Artemis Moon program remains unaffected. These developments raise questions about the future accessibility of space and science education.

Blue Origin set to launch 15th space tourism mission

This morning, Blue Origin is set to launch its 15th space tourism mission, bringing six people into space. This is some of the crew ready for liftoff, except for one person who decided to remain unnamed until after the flight, which is really interesting. But Dr. Clint Kelly will be flying for the second time. CBS News space analyst Bill Harwood joins us now from the, whoa, it's a Wednesday, Bill, from the Kennedy Space Center with more on this. Bill, good morning. What can you tell us about today's launch and the crew, especially someone going for a second time? Well, good morning. You know, this is a, it's another flight with six, we presume, wealthy entrepreneurs. You've got the first female flyer from Kazakhstan on board. There's a Ukrainian entrepreneur, and as you said, one person who's making his second trip to space with Blue Origin. You know, it's interesting. You mentioned space tourism, and I think about that a lot because I really don't know if you can call it tourism. You know, I mean, you don't go on a 10-minute trip and say you're a tourist. But, you know, in the journalism world, we hadn't come up with a better expression yet, but I'm not sure, you know, thrill seeker might fit, I guess, or adventurer would fit. But space tourist, I don't know, I don't know what that really means. That's a great question. Maybe space voyeurism, since you're just going and observing? I don't know. We need to come up with something. But we heard this week Bill Nye the Science Guy on Capitol Hill speaking about how the Trump administration's proposed budget cuts to NASA might impact that agency overall. How might cuts impact NASA? It's potentially very significant. You know, the Trump administration has announced plans earlier in the year to cut NASA's budget by something like 25%. And a big chunk of that's coming from the science budget. There are active probes that would be turned off, stop collecting data from them, even though they're still working. Very disappointing to the science community. STEM education, public affairs, you know, the NASA website, which is one of the 10 most visited sites on the internet, is down right now. It won't be back until the government's funded. It's having a big impact. Now, one thing that it's not affecting is the Artemis Moon program. You know, NASA's trying to get astronauts to fly around the moon in February. That is on track and those people are still at work. But it's had a major impact already and it's gonna be more than that when all is said and done. And it's interesting because at the same time, you've got space tourism or voyeurism growing in popularity, but some of the things that make it accessible to people through funding from the government is shrinking. So how can access to science and all the things that inspire people to pursue these careers, how can that be made more accessible, do you think? Well, that's a good question. You know, these, quote, space tourism flights, they do fly professional researchers from time to time where their organizations or institutions put up the money to fly them. NASA, of course, launches astronauts to the space station and they hope to be launching astronauts to the moon. But for private citizens, whether you're a researcher or not, the price is pretty extreme. You know, the six people going up today with Blue Origin, we don't know what they pay because they keep that secret, but it's certainly more than a half a million dollars a ticket. And again, we're talking about a 10 minute flight. Yeah, so I don't think this is very accessible at all unless you're a 1%-er or somebody way up there that's got the wherewithal to afford it. Right, the rest of us can just go camping and stare straight up to see the stars. Bill, always great to see you. Thanks for being with us today.

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