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Actor William Shatner, 90, Goes Boldly Into Space

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"Star Trek" actor William Shatner, 2nd left, speaks to the news media with the three other crew members after their flight in a capsule powered by Blue Origin's reusable rocket engine New Shepard, on a landing pad near Van Horn, Texas, October 13, 2021.
"Star Trek" actor William Shatner, 2nd left, speaks to the news media with the three other crew members after their flight in a capsule powered by Blue Origin's reusable rocket engine New Shepard, on a landing pad near Van Horn, Texas, October 13, 2021.

Canadian actor William Shatner and three other people flew to space Wednesday aboard the second passenger flight operated by Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin.

The fully automated flight lasted about 10 minutes and took the all-civilian crew about 100 kilometers above Earth.

The trip made the 90-year-old Shatner the oldest person to go into space, a fitting endeavor for the actor who portrayed Captain James T. Kirk in television and movie editions of "Star Trek."

"It was so moving to me," Shatner said after landing. "This experience is something unbelievable."

"Star Trek" actor William Shatner experiences weightlessness during the apogee of the Blue Origin New Shepard mission NS-18 suborbital flight near Van Horn, Texas, in a still image from video, October 13, 2021. (Blue Origin/Handout via Reuters)
"Star Trek" actor William Shatner experiences weightlessness during the apogee of the Blue Origin New Shepard mission NS-18 suborbital flight near Van Horn, Texas, in a still image from video, October 13, 2021. (Blue Origin/Handout via Reuters)


"I'm so filled with emotion about what just happened. … It's extraordinary," he told Bezos. "I hope I never recover from this. I hope that I can maintain what I feel now," he said. "I don't want to lose it."

Other members of the crew included former NASA engineer Chris Boshuizen, clinical research entrepreneur Glen de Vries, and Audrey Powers, a Blue Origin vice president and engineer.

Blue Origin completed its first commercial flight in July when Bezos and three others went on a 10-minute suborbital journey.

Some information for this report came from the Associated Press and Reuters.

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