A University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill student made history as part of a six-person crew flying on a Blue Origin mission.
Karsen Kitchen, 21, became the youngest woman ever to travel into space.
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The Blue Origin program has flown 37 people past the Kármán line, the internationally recognized boundary that separates the Earth's atmosphere and outer space.
The flight, New Shepard (NS)-26, lifted off Thursday morning from Launch Site One in west Texas.
The crew included the following people:
- Nicolina Elrick
- Rob Ferl
- Eugene Grin
- Dr. Eiman Jahangir
- Karsen Kitchen
- Ephraim Rabin
You can watch the launch here, and WRAL News livestreamed the launch.
Following in her father's footsteps
The step into the great unknown runs in the family. Karsen's father, UNC professor Jim Kitchen, went to space with Blue Origin in 2022.
Karsen is majoring in communications and astronomy at UNC. She is pursuing a career in the space industry.
In 2024, Kitchen founded Orbitelle, an initiative that encourages women to pursue careers in the space industry.
Karsen has researched radio astronomy at the Green Bank Observatory in West Virginia and worked at UNC's Morehead Planetarium. The Durham Academy graduate has experienced weightlessness during a Zero-Gravity flight, and is currently in training for her scuba diving license.