Billionaire Bezos Ready to Realize Dream of Traveling to Space  

American businessman Jeff Bezos is set to become the second billionaire to self-fund a trip to space this month when he blasts off Tuesday morning from a remote desert launch site in Texas.   

The 57-year-old founder of e-commerce giant Amazon and three companions will fly into space aboard the New Shepard rocket built by his company Blue Origin, which he founded in 2000 with the goal of creating permanent space colonies where people will live and work.    New Shepard, named after Alan Shepard, America’s first astronaut, is scheduled to blast off shortly after sunrise (300 GMT, 7 a.m. Washington time) and travel at three times the speed of sound before the capsule separates from the rocket and floats above the Earth for three to four minutes, allowing Bezos and his three crewmates to experience weightlessness. The capsule will then re-enter the atmosphere and make a parachute landing near the launch site, while the rocket will make an automated vertical landing several miles away.    Bezos will be joined by his brother, Mark, plus 82-year-old aviation pioneer Mary Wallace “Wally” Funk and 18-year-old Oliver Daemen, making them the oldest and youngest persons to fly into space.