William Shatner's Blue Origin flight delayed due to bad weather conditions

Star Trek actor William Shatner is all set to rocket off into outer space in the next Blue Origin rocket ship from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. However, Shatner aka Captain Kirk will have to wait for one more day to set out on his voyage. The Blue Origin's space flight was about to take off with Shatner and three others on Tuesday, October 12, from Texas, however, the fight has now been postponed owing to bad weather.

William Shatner's space flight delayed

The official Twitter handle of Jeff Bezos' aerospace company Blue Origin announced that their next mission, known as NS-18, will launch on Wednesday, October 13, rather than the originally scheduled one day prior. The voyage was delayed due to unfavourable weather conditions. They wrote, "Due to forecasted winds in West Texas we are pushing #NS18 launch target to Wednesday, October 13. Liftoff is targeted for 8:30 am CDT / 13:30 UTC. The live broadcast begins at T-90 mins on http://BlueOrigin.com. Stay tuned for more details."

Mission NS18 will be the company’s second launch with a crew. Shatner will be joining crew members Chris Boshuizen, co-founder of Earth observation company Planet Labs and Glen de Vries vice-chairperson for life sciences and healthcare at French software company Dassault Systèmes and co-founder of Medidata. The up-and-down space hop will last 10 minutes and reach no higher than about 66 miles (106 kilometres). At the age of 90, Shatner will be the oldest person to venture into outer space.

As per People, the veteran actor recently spoke to audiences at the New York Comic-Con about his upcoming trip to orbit. Answering one of the audience questions about how he really feels about going into space, the 90-year-old said, "I'm terrified, I'm Captain Kirk, and I'm terrified going to space. You know, I'm not really terrified. Yes, I am. It comes and goes like a summer cold." Shatner also revealed that the idea of him going into space was conceived by his friend and Better Late Than Never producer, Jason Ehrlich for planting the idea in his head.

He said, "So [Jason] came to me about a year and a half ago and he said, you know, they're starting to send these rockets up with people into space. Wouldn't it be something if Captain Kirk went up there? And I said, 'Jason, for God's sakes, man, nobody cares about Captain Kirk going up into space. You know, it was 55 years ago, by God, man!. So he continued to sell me on the idea and bless his soul. Blue Origin is the idea."

(Image: AP)