"Then she kind of asked me, "Do you think I could be an astronaut?" I mean, technically, you don't need your legs, and so on and so forth. When I realized that she meant New Shepard, I said, 'Well, let me talk to people I know.' So I called Audrey Powers ( a Blue Origin engineer), and she said she loved the project. In a very subtle and slippery slope, I thought about this and said, "Actually, I think I can do this, too.""
"All of the above. I don't know what they did for safety. I know what SpaceX did for safety. So I talked to a few people who worked there. And it all came down to the point that they would all fly on New Shepard. But for me, the ultimate discriminator is if you would let your children fly on it. And later, when we met them, I asked a lot of technical questions on the safety side, and I feel like they answered the majority of them thoughtfully"
A prospective participant considered suborbital flight after learning New Shepard could accommodate disability and after contacting a Blue Origin engineer who endorsed the project. The participant recognized that suborbital flight would not prevent future orbital ambitions and reflected on personal risk tolerance. Extensive conversations with acquaintances and nonfriends produced no objections to flying. Primary concerns included safety and the optics of flying for someone with a long SpaceX career. Detailed technical questions were asked of the New Shepard team, and their thoughtful answers about safety increased confidence in proceeding with the mission.
Read at Ars Technica
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