A historic all-women crew is set to take to space as part of Blue Origin's New Shepard's 31st mission and none other than 'Dark Horse' singer Katy Perry is onboard.
Blue Origin's rocket ship mission is scheduled to launch on Monday (April 14) from Launch Site One in West Texas at 10am EDT.
The flight is the first all-women crew to launch into space since 1963 when Valentina Tereshkova was sent into orbit by herself by the Soviet Union.
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The all-women crew is made up of Perry, alongside former NASA rocket scientist Aisha Bowe, documentary producer Kerianne Flynn, bioatronautic research scientist Amanda Nguyễn and author and journalist Lauren Sánchez - who's also engaged to Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos.
Why is Katy Perry going to space ?
Sánchez, who led the organization of the historic mission, told Elle she chose each of the women because of how much of an inspiration they are to others in their own unique ways - all 'storytellers in their own right'.
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She said: "They’re going to go up to space and be able to spread what they felt in different ways."
Indeed, Bowe voiced how she 'read a stat that there’s a huge majority of middle school girls who decide not to pursue STEM fields, although they otherwise would have been interested, because they see them as male-dominated fields' and so 'this representation really matters'.
"It’s people seeing themselves and being able to show up authentically in their careers in the future," she added.
Perry reflected when she first heard Blue Origin was talking about commercial travel to space she immediately wanted to be involved but was surprised she got the invite.
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"And then they told me about it being the first all-female crew," she continued. "I take pause in those moments and ask the universe to give me confirmations. And I really felt very sure when they sent me the picture of the space pod, because on the front of the pod is a feather, and that’s my mom’s nickname for me. And so I was like, Okay, I see it."
Perry sees the opportunity to go to space as part of an all-women crew as a way to not only make space 'glam' but also to 'inspire' a 'whole new generation' - including her daughter Daisy - to 'never have limits on [their] dreams and show [them] that any type of person can reach their dreams no matter your background, your ethnicity, your economic situation, or your education level'.
Nguyễn added: "I think it’s so important for people to see us like that. This dichotomy of engineer and scientist, and then beauty and fashion. We contain multitudes. Women are multitudes. I’m going to be wearing lipstick."
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But what are the women going to do when up there?
The plan when up there
Well, the entire trip is only expected to last 11 minutes.
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And within those 11 minutes, the women are anticipated as spending a grand total of four minutes in actual space before heading straight back down to Earth again - hardly enough time to even bash out one of Perry's songs.
However, Perry said the plan to perform a rendition of a song is for the journey up there - 'We’re going to be singing that all the way up,' she said, with King having hinted it'll be the hym 'I Surrender All'.
After all, Firework' would probably be a little alarming right?
However, Kerianne Flynn noted Perry could 'be the first [music artist] in space to sing' and Perry responded: "I feel like I should."
So maybe 'E.T.' could work eh?
Topics: Space, Katy Perry, Celebrity
Poppy Bilderbeck