Paraplegic engineer becomes the first wheelchair user to blast into space
In short:
A paraplegic engineer from Germany became the first wheelchair user to enter space, on Saturday.
Michaela Benthaus was a passenger on a Blue Origin flight, soaring 105 kilometres up and floating in space for more than 3 minutes.
What's next?
Ms Benthaus now hopes to make space more accessible for disabled people.
A paraplegic engineer from Germany has become the first wheelchair user in space, launching from West Texas with Jeff Bezos's company Blue Origin on Saturday.
The flight was just 10 minutes but the capsule still managed to soar 105 kilometres up, skimming into space.
Michaela Benthaus, 33, was able to float in space for more than 3 minutes, leaving her wheelchair behind, which she has used since being severely injured in a mountain bike accident seven years ago.
The Blue Origin capsule floated back to the ground with parachutes on Saturday. (AP: Blue Origin)
Ms Benthaus said she laughed all the way up.
"It was the coolest experience," she said shortly after landing.
Ms Benthaus shared the ride with five other passengers including business executives, investors and a computer scientist, raising Blue Origin's list of space travellers to 86.
One passenger was retired SpaceX executive Hans Koenigsmann, who helped organise and sponsor her trip with Blue Origin.
Their ticket prices were not divulged.
Making space accessible for disabled people
Ms Benthaus was part of the European Space Agency's graduate trainee program in the Netherlands, so she had experienced snippets of weightlessness in test flights previously.
In 2022 Ms Benthaus was on a parabolic aeroplane flight out of Houston, but says she never thought going to space would be possible.
"I never really thought that going on a spaceflight would be a real option for me because even as like a super healthy person, it's like so competitive, right?" she told The Associated Press ahead of the flight.
"There is like no history of people with disabilities flying to space," she said.
Michaela Benthaus has been in a wheelchair for seven years, after a mountain bike accident. (AP: Blue Origin)
When Mr Koenigsmann approached her last year about the possibility of flying on Blue Origin and experiencing more than 3 minutes of weightlessness on a space hop, Ms Benthaus thought there might be a misunderstanding.
But there wasn't, and she immediately signed on.
Her goal is to now make not only space accessible to the disabled, but to improve accessibility on Earth too.
"I really hope it's opening up for people like me, like I hope I'm only the start," she said.
Minor adjustments to space capsule
An injured spinal cord means Ms Benthaus can't walk at all, but the autonomous New Shepard capsule required only minor adjustments to accommodate her, according to the company.
Blue Origin's flight engineer, Jake Mills, said that was because it was designed with accessibility in mind, "making it more accessible to a wider range of people than traditional spaceflight".
Blue Origin launched its first passenger spaceflight in 2021. (AP: Blue Origin)
An elevator was in place at the launch pad to ascend the seven storeys to the capsule perched atop the rocket.
Blue Origin added a patient transfer board so Ms Benthaus could scoot between the capsule's hatch and her seat.
The recovery team also unrolled a carpet on the desert floor following touchdown, providing immediate access to her wheelchair, which she left behind at lift-off.
Following touchdown Ms Benthaus said: "You should never give up on your dreams, right?"
AP