{"id":463050,"date":"2025-12-21T22:17:14","date_gmt":"2025-12-21T22:17:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/463050\/"},"modified":"2025-12-21T22:17:14","modified_gmt":"2025-12-21T22:17:14","slug":"blue-origin-rockets-first-wheelchair-user-into-space","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/463050\/","title":{"rendered":"Blue Origin Rockets First Wheelchair User Into Space"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" alt=\"blue origin\" data-flatplan-id=\"flatplan_mainMedia\" width=\"320\" height=\"180\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"shadow-md rounded-lg object-contain h-auto w-full flatplan_mainMedia\" style=\"color:transparent\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/ap25354537540081.jpg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>This image provided by Blue Origin, Michaela Benthaus poses after the Blue Origin&#8217;s capsule landed on Saturday, Dec. 20, 2025, in West Texas.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"m-0 text-gray-500\">(Blue Origin via AP)<\/p>\n<p>A new boundary has been broken as Michaela Benthaus, a paraplegic engineer, became the first wheelchair user to float in space.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI never really thought that going on a spaceflight would be a real option for me because even as like a super healthy person, it\u2019s like so competitive, right?\u201d she told the Associated Press.<\/p>\n<p>Blasting off from West Texas with Jeff Bezos\u2019 company Blue Origin, the flight lasted 10 minutes and reached a height of more than 65 miles above the earth.<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"320\" height=\"180\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"object-contain h-auto m-0 w-37.5\" style=\"color:transparent\"  src=\"https:\/\/weather.com\/_next\/static\/media\/morning-brief-logo.73126316.svg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Weather in your inbox<\/p>\n<p>By signing up you agree to the <a href=\"https:\/\/weather.com\/legal\" class=\"underline\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Terms<\/a> &amp; <a href=\"https:\/\/weather.com\/en-US\/twc\/privacy-policy\" class=\"underline\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Privacy Policy<\/a>. Unsubscribe at any time.<\/p>\n<p>Benthaus had done some prior training, including a two-week simulated space mission in Poland and a parabolic flight out of Houston, which allows passengers to experience brief moments of weightlessness.<\/p>\n<p>Yet, Benthaus did not expect this trip.<\/p>\n<p>Hans Koenigsmann, a retired SpaceX executive, reached out to offer her a ride on a flight he was organizing.<\/p>\n<p>Benthaus thought at first that the offer might be a misunderstanding. She severely injured her spinal cord in a mountain bike accident seven years ago.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere is like no history of people with disabilities flying to space,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p>When she discovered that Blue Origin\u2019s space capsule had been designed for a range of accessibility and that Koenigsmann was offering to sponsor her trip, she immediately agreed.<\/p>\n<p>Koenigsmann and Benthaus practiced in advance of the flight, with Koenigsmann designated as her helper in case of an emergency.<\/p>\n<p>The flight went off without a hitch. When the capsule touched down in the desert, the team unrolled a carpet that provided immediate access to her wheelchair, which she left behind at liftoff.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI really hope it\u2019s opening up for people like me, like I hope I\u2019m only the start,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p>The Associated Press contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This image provided by Blue Origin, Michaela Benthaus poses after the Blue Origin&#8217;s capsule landed on Saturday, Dec.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":463051,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[50,159,783,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-463050","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-news","9":"tag-science","10":"tag-space","11":"tag-united-states","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115759877777043088","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463050","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=463050"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/463050\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/463051"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=463050"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=463050"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=463050"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}