exploding out of the capsule. if you watched her in run up to flight in coverage, she was ecstatic to be finally making the journey, decades after not allowed to do so because she was a woman to taking this flight. this moment for her is incredibly special. have to think it is special for women in particular looking at her going yep, not to be cheesy, dreams do come true, right? she s making history as oldest person ever to go history, too. as you see the shot, if we let it play, she s about to walk out. i don t think it s just for women. it s a story for all of us. right. the interesting part about space exploration, what happened in the 1960s with the mercury 13, is that there were 13 women
women getting into space, trained in the 1960s. she underwent training, part of the so-called mercury 13, underwent training privately funded to show that women could pass the strenuous requirements that nasa had set up for astronauts, but they only allowed male astronauts at that time. her dream was to get into space. she has had a remarkable career. she was the first female faa inspector, the first ntsb or safety investigator to be a woman. so she has had a remarkable career as a pilot obviously in her own right. and now she is getting to fulfill a lifelong dream. wally funk, excuse me, i think i said wally lamb. wally funk. her full name is mary wallace funk. she s called wally funk. also, oliver damon, 18 years old, we were talking with rachel and kristen. they were he will be heading to college this fall. quite a lucky young man, and
wally funk was trained to be an astronaut in the 1960s. part of the group known as of the mercury 13. they never made it to space because only men were sent at the time. women proved they could pass the rigorous physical requirements that nasa had set up. also aboard today, an 18-year-old, recent high school graduate will be blue origin s first paying customer and also the youngest person by many years ever to go into space. new shepherd has flown 15 times so far. it s never had humans on board. the capsule is fully autonomous, it means there is no pilot which they say is safer than having pilots because most problems with the aircraft and spacecraft are due to pilot error. if jeff bezos turned space traveller is nervous about his historic mission, he s not letting anyone see him sweat. we really believe this flight is safe. we wouldn t people say i had friends say to me, how about
back in the 60s, part of the mercury 13, but she was never given the opportunity to fly because of her gender. but that all changed today, and she got her astronaut wings. she was so excited, alisyn and victor, at this press conference, i mean she really couldn t stay in her seat. i was in the front row and i thought she was going to leap into my lap. take a listen to what she had to say. i was going into space and i want to thank you, sweetheart, because you made it possible for me. i ve been waiting a long time to finally get it up there. i felt so charged. i was not i was just normal, normal person going up into space, and that s what i wanted to feel. reporter: so, alisyn and victor, a lot of people thought bezos was crazy to get into this capsule and go on this flight. that s because this vehicle had never flown humans before. that was the historic first
we re going to bring it to you live. i want to bring back a couple other folks. both former nasa astronauts. so we have talked a bit about the big picture, philosophical piece of this launch. we have talked about the brains and the science behind it. i want to stay on this topic of wally funk. and what we might hear from her. lauren put it well. can you talk about the impact to young women. of seeing not just you on our air today and everything you have done and the accomplishments you have had talking about this, but to see wally funk, to look at somebody, even like an 18-year-old and to look and say, hey, that s the next generation of potential space pioneers here. so let me just add a little bit to what lauren said. when wally funk and the mercury 13, they were tested for their suitability. they did better than men. they were not rejected because of the jet training. they were rejected because