Jeff Bezos, world's richest man, flies to space

The spacecraft ignited its BE-3 engines for a liftoff from Blue Origin's Launch Site One facility about 20 miles (32 km) outside the rural town of Van Horn, flying about 66.5 miles (107 km) above the planet's surface. There were generally clear skies with a few patchy clouds on a cool morning for the launch.

The 57-year-old American billionaire flew on a voyage lasting about 10 minutes and 20 seconds to the edge of space, nine days after Briton Richard Branson was aboard his competing space tourism company Virgin Galactic's successful inaugural suborbital flight from New Mexico.