The richest man in the whole wide world on Monday announced that he was going to fly to space next month on the first space flight from his rocket company Blue Origin.
Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos, who is worth a staggering $177 billion – up $64 billion from a year ago, said in an Instagram post: “Ever since I was five years old, I’ve dreamed of traveling to space. On July 20th, I will take that journey with my brother”.
Blue Origin closed the first round of its auction for possible passengers to space last month and said it had received more than 5,200 bidders from 136 countries.
The highest bid stood at $2.8 million (R38 million) in the ongoing second round of auction.
Some US media reports say the auction process will last until June 10 and conclude in a final phase on June 12.
Blue Origin is targeting July 20 for its first suborbital sightseeing trip on its spacecraft.
This will be a landmark moment in a competition to usher in a new era of private commercial space travel.
