The first all-women flight crew has officially gone to space.

On Monday, Flight NS-31 took off from West Texas on a round trip that lasted roughly eight minutes.

Inside the spacecraft were pop star Katy Perry, TV reporter Lauren Sánchez, journalist Gayle King, bioastronautic research scientist Amanda Nguyen, former NASA rocket scientist Aisha Bowe, and film producer Kerianne Flynn. 

Perry’s husband, Orlando Bloom, and their daughter, Daisy, were present at the launch, as were Sánchez’s fiancé, Jeff Bezos, King’s famous close friend Oprah Winfrey, and reality stars Khloé Kardashian and Kris Jenner.

Upon landing, Perry promptly kissed the dirt, soon joined by King. Perry announced she needed to have, “A moment with the ground.” She added, “Just need to appreciate the ground for a second.”

King remarked after the flight that space was “oddly quiet.”

“It’s really quiet and peaceful. And you look down there, and you think, ’That’s where we came from?’ To me, it’s such a reminder about how we need to do better, be better. Do better, be better human beings.”

King shared the importance of the flight: “It’s about us, it’s about making space for future women, and taking up space and belonging…And it’s about this wonderful world that we see right out there and appreciating it. This is all for the benefit of Earth.”

While the historic flight of the six women has been praised as groundbreaking, many have also condemned the journey as attention-seeking.

In an April 3 episode of Today with Jenna and Friends, actress Olivia Munn criticized public figures for their privileged behavior.

“What are they doing?” she said. “I know this probably isn’t the cool thing to say…but there are so many other things that are so important in the world right now…If you wanna go to space, why do you need to tell us about it, you know? It’s just like, go up there, have a good time, come on down.

“What’s the point? Is it historic that you guys are going on a ride? I think it’s a bit gluttonous… Space exploration was to further our knowledge… What are they gonna do up there that has made it better for us down here?”

New York Times writer Jessica Grose previously labeled such space missions a “vanity space flight” and a “moral vacuum.”

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Article by Baila Eve Zisman

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