Bezos and crewmates prepare for inaugural Blue Origin space flight

Billionaire American businessman Jeff Bezos and his three crewmates are engaging in a crash course of training on Sunday in preparation for his company Blue Origin's inaugural flight to the edge of space planned for Tuesday.

The suborbital launch from a site in the high desert plains of West Texas marks a crucial test for Blue Origin's New Shepard spacecraft, a 60-foot-tall (18.3 metre) and fully autonomous rocket-and-capsule combo that is central to plans by Bezos to tap a potentially lucrative space tourism market.

The planned 11-minute trip from the company's Launch Site One facility is set to include the oldest person ever to go to space, the 82-year-old female aviator Wally Funk and the youngest 18-year-old Oliver Daemen and his brother Mark Bezos.

New Shepard is due to launch nine days after rival Richard Branson's space tourism company, Virgin Galactic, successfully carried out a suborbital flight from New Mexico with the British billionaire inside its rocket plane.

The mission would represent the world's first unpiloted flight to space with an all-civilian crew. Blue Origin will have none of its staff astronauts or trained personnel onboard.

Blue Origin's training programme, according to the company, includes safety briefings, a simulation of the spaceflight, a review of the rocket and its operations, and instruction on how to float around the craft's cabin after the capsule sheds Earth's gravity.

The training "will help you feel comfortable and prepared for spaceflight and your responsibilities as an astronaut," Blue Origin said in material describing the sessions.