i'm astronaut mike massimino and i am
going to attempt to explain to you
what jeff bezos's flight will be like in
just about the same amount of time
that it will take him to take that
flight t-minus 50 seconds
until takeoff the blue origin flight is
only going to be 11 minutes
you get inside there's no pilots it's
totally automated
everything should work perfectly if it
doesn't there are backup systems
but there's really no human intervention
with that spacecraft and it'll come back
to earth so it's like again in the ride
go up weightless look at the planet look
around a little bit
and then come back down jeffrey bezos is
set to leave july 20th with his brother
a space tourist who paid 28 million
dollars and wally funk
who is 82 years old this is nine days
after richard branson took his virgin
space flight
oh my god so let's start off with a
countdown for mission control t-minus
ten
nine eight seven six
five four command engine start
two one
first liftoff the crew will strap in and
prepare for their launch
the engines will light and take them off
the launch pad
i think the most important thing during
liftoff is to pay attention
be alert and don't touch anything you're
not supposed to
that's what i would say you know i don't
say hey i wonder what this button does
don't do anything
i went to space on the space shuttle
uh the main engine started up first we
were on our backs
waiting there on the launch pad for a
couple hours making sure everything was
okay
and the main engine started they ran for
about six seconds
firing his arm but after those six
seconds the solid rocket boosters would
light
and they're like giant sticks of
dynamite you could not turn those off so
once they light you're on your way
my first launch seemed like a blink i
didn't even i
never it went by so quickly everything
was so new
but the second time i i felt like i was
a little more uh
engaged because i knew what was going to
happen and i just wanted to enjoy it as
best i could
and i think that's the that's the
important thing this is a very rare
experience
getting a chance to be under powered
flight with a big rocket motor
underneath you
taking you away from the planet t plus
two minutes
light hits mach three after a couple
minutes
the g forces build up the maximum g's
that we took were three g's now what
that means is that's three times the
force of gravity that's hitting you in
the chest you're on your back because
that's the best way to take that g-force
is right in the chest
it feels like a pile of bricks is on
your chest like you have three big dudes
sitting on you that's kind of what i
felt like three times my body weight hit
me in the chest
and that lasted for about two and a half
minutes
when you experience zero gravity is
dependent on
when your engines stop running
i was under those g-forces and then the
engines
cut and it got really quiet and all the
violence all the shaking stopped
and everything started to float i was
still strapped in my seat
but my arms just rose up like this t
plus three minutes
capsule separates from booster zero g
begins
next the crew will enter zero gravity
they will experience
weightlessness for a few minutes one of
the first things i noticed when i got to
space was i didn't feel so well
i just felt nauseous and i knew this
could happen
it happens to most astronauts because
your inner ear is not working
it works on gravity so the vestibular
system
inner ear zero gravity nothing's
happened it's telling the brain you are
perfectly still
but as you're moving around your eyes
are saying oh no you're not you're
moving around
so you can get that conflict and it can
lead to disorientation and nausea my
advice to anyone going on one of these
trips is medicaid take the nausea
medicine that's available to you they're
pretty good pretty good nausea medicine
these days
ask the medical officer there's got to
be someone that knows about that stuff
working at these companies what do you
suggest take that stuff
and uh i think that'll help you enjoy
the experience because why take the
chance
you might unstrap and feel really awful
and it's only a couple minutes so
that's what i would do t plus four
minutes light reaches apogee
and the flight will reach its apogee
which means its highest point
away from the planet they'll be able to
unstrap float around a little bit and
take a look out the window so we would
want to be really careful when you first
get to space you're kind of out of
control
when i first got to space i went to look
out the window and i felt kind of out of
control i
was just it's like and a walk again
you're just moving around
and i grabbed something and i grabbed a
circuit breaker which i wasn't supposed
to grab and
pulled it out and it wasn't supposed to
happen like it's like oh my goodness the
first thing i've done in space was
something wrong
but of course i reported it you know to
my commander in the grounds i had to
worry about it was just
a switch that really wasn't needed at
that time so i just put it back in
but it made me realize you got to be
careful around here watch what you're
holding on to
so if you get out of control you're
liable to do something you might regret
so you want to be really careful about
that
you usually want to go slowly and be
under control
so you can enjoy the experience you can
move around more actually more
efficiently and quickly when you
when you do that so go slow to speed up
and that's what i wanted to do on my
first space flight of course was unstrap
and take a look at the planet
and that's what i did i got a chance to
to see the planet from space for the
first time
and that's the moment that you're
looking forward to the overview effect
is the term that is used for the
experience
that people have gone above the karman
line
astronauts when they view the planet
you're seeing it from a
from a different perspective and it can
change the way that you feel about
the earth or or role in the universe or
the
beauty of our planet and that all those
different emotions and feelings that
people have tried to describe
over the years since we first started
sending people to space
has been uh kind of put in this category
of the overview effect
and i think most people feel that as
well where you see the thinness of the
atmosphere and you see the beauty of our
planet
i think mainly it's it's an emotional
experience of
what it's like to look back on our home
uh from space
t plus six minutes time for re-entry
astronauts rebuckle then the crews will
start their descent
back toward earth as they get closer to
the planet the g-forces will build up
again
and they'll start to feel heavy if we
have to be in weight let's going from
zero
to something feels a lot more than it
than it would be your your
whole your body's is getting used to
that again and that we were but i was in
space for
a couple weeks i don't know what it's
going to be like for them it'll be an
interesting question what was it like
after just being there
for a few minutes did your body have to
go through another orientation to
readjust the gravity so we'll see what
happens but it's more a function of
of slowing down and having the earth
pull you back in than it is of any
particular altitude or speed
tomorrow's a big day for you i mean
you've had all kinds of big days but
it's tomorrow kind of the biggest day
for you
very special and that's because
so on my flights uh on the space shuttle
when we were coming back to earth
you know we were orbiting at 17 500
miles an hour
and so what we did is we pointed our
rocket ship the the rocket itself the
back end of the space shuttle where the
engines were
not the main engines but these two big
engine bells on the side
and we would burn those engines we'd
we'd light them up what that did is that
propelled us
in the opposite direction and kind of
acted like putting on the brakes
and so as you as you slow down you'll
get lower and lower
and then eventually you'll pick up the
earth's atmosphere as your as your
altitude lowers
that builds up friction a lot of heat in
the case of the shuttles about four to
five thousand degrees
outside of the space shuttle was got
really hot we felt fine inside
but i could see the tail i held up i was
on the flight deck
and i could see uh by holding up a
mirror i was able to
look out the window and see the tail of
the space shuttle
and i was filming it for a while i was
like that's kind of cool looks like the
tail is almost on fire
and i was like that's kind of scary
enough of that and then we got below
that and we picked up the horizon of the
earth again
what's different about the jeff bezos in
richard branson's space flights compared
to what we've done up till now
is that this truly i think marks the
entry point
of commercial space flight unlike
spaceships that carry astronauts
to the international space station
they're typically flying for their
governments
this is a new way that people can get to
space
with a commercial company and a private
enterprise
t-plus nine minutes parachutes deploy
and then they will land with a parachute
very close to where they took off
you know kind of like almost an
amusement park ride we got lower and
lower
and at one point we picked up like as
we're picking up the atmosphere it
almost seemed like we were in a cloud we
were just exciting the particles around
us
so it's almost like we're in a soup and
we're like you know what we would say
like when you're flying an airplane
you're in the soup you're just in a
cloud you can't see anything and i i had
no sensation of motion
you know we still didn't have g's really
building up at that point
but i had no visual indication out the
window that we were moving at all
and i felt like i was perfectly still no
indication of motion at all
until i looked at our velocity indicator
we're still going about 12 000 miles an
hour
at that point that's the only thing they
told me was still moving t
plus 10 minutes capsule lands
finally touchdown the crew will have
completed their journey to space
and back i think they're pretty much
going to be able to get off and walk
away just like they're getting off an
airplane
um in both the in both the blue origin
and the uh
virgin galactic examples your body
hasn't had
any deterioration it hasn't been much of
an adaptation because it wasn't very
long
to zero gravity so i think they'll come
back and be in
in in one gravity without without any
issues
uh we had been in space in my case on
the shuttle usually typically it was
about a two week journey
that's what it was for me because you're
adjusting to gravity but that was the
goal you wanted to do that and look up
and point to the spaceship
and not fall over you know like i was a
zombie or herman munster or somebody
like walking her
frankenstein moving around so i wouldn't
fall over very slowly
on my flights once we landed you know
you're you're
back on the runway now you're grateful
to be home and safe
i don't think you're going to need the
same physical conditioning that we need
that i needed when i was an astronaut to
fly to space i think it's going to be
more like
the amusement park restrictions mission
accomplished i would love to go on one
of these flights
with richard branson or with jeff bezos
or with anyone else i was interested in
going
but i don't want to pay that much money
for it so i'm not paying for that
experience
but i would be happy to go if they want
an interested
observer or maybe some help you know i
could be the flight attendant
i'm happy to do whatever they would want
me to do on one of these flights i would
love to do it
but that the ticket price is a little
much for me right now
uh i i think i'll wait till the price
comes down if i have to pay for it
even though only it's a couple minutes
they will get a chance to look around
to look at our planet to experience
weightlessness
and especially that view of our planet
and what it looks like
from space they'll be able to get a
pretty good look at it even though
for a couple minutes we understand a lot
about how our planet works
by being here on the planet but there's
still a lot of big questions
like where did we come from how did we
get here and
how to best take care of our planet that
i think we can only answer by traveling
to space
because it gives you that different
perspective so i'm interested to see
what these two guys in particular who
are
very interesting people very successful
entrepreneurs
have experienced a lot of things in
their lives i want to
find out how this experience of flying
to space
will have changed them