Portuguese American pop singer, Katy Perry will fly to space during Blue Origin’s next crewed mission, the Jeff Bezos-owned space company has announced.

According to Blue Origin, this will be the first all-female spaceflight since 1963, when the Soviet Union sent Valentina Tereshkova as the sole astronaut on a historic mission.

Aboard the New Shepard rocket this spring, the all-female crew will include CBS host Gayle King and Bezos’s fiancée, Lauren Sánchez, research scientist and activist Amanda Nguyen, film producer Kerianne Flynn, and former NASA rocket scientist Aisha Bowe. 

Blue Origin’s most recent human spaceflight, with a six-person crew reaching the edge of space, experienced zero gravity for a few minutes before returning to Earth. The NS-31 mission has yet to announce its official launch date but is expected to take place sometime this spring.

The fully autonomous trip will last approximately 11 minutes, with passengers traveling beyond the Kármán line—the internationally recognized boundary between Earth’s atmosphere and outer space.

Blue Origin, founded in 2000, is a billion-dollar private space exploration company.  Since 2021, the company has launched 52 people into space aboard its New Shepard rocket, including Star Trek actor William Shatner and Bezos himself.

Katy Perry, 40, who has acknowledged her Portuguese heritage, was born in Santa Barbara, California, to parents of German, English and Portuguese descent, with roots in Faial, Azores.

During her career, Katy Perry was nominated for numerous music awards, with 13 wins of 27 nominations and has hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 nine times.

PAJ/Staff