HUNTSVILLE — In recognition of Earth Day on Sunday, Blue Origin is raising awareness about the importance of protecting the planet with several “For the Benefit of Earth Day” events scheduled for Saturday across the city.
The day includes Blue Origin’s first local race event starting at Columbia High School at 300 Explorer Drive in Cummings Research Park at 9 a.m.
Depending on your level of expertise, you can explore our gem of a planet step-by-step by choosing from the 1-mile, 5K and 10K races.
The race route departs Columbia High School and turns left onto Explorer Boulevard. Runners will turn right on Mark C Smith Drive, right on Discovery Drive, right on Explorer Boulevard and back to Columbia High School.
The one-mile route turns around at Farrow Road. The 5K involves one lap, while the 10K is two laps.
Blue Origin said participants do not have to pre-register and are welcome to just show up and run … or walk, if you prefer. For those who choose to walk the course, organizers ask them to bring a garbage bag and help clean up the roadside.
This is the first year Blue Origin has sponsored Earth Day events, but the company did a dry run late last year.
“We had a little fun with the 10K race,” said Michael Edmonds, senior vice president of strategy, marketing and sales. “The demarcation of space is 100 km, which is 62 miles – that is the ‘Kármán Line’ where space begins. The 10k race at 6.2 miles which is 1/10th of the distance to the Kármán Line.”
For those who aren’t competing, there are other ways to get involved.
Blue Origin is sponsoring volunteers to build wheelchair ramps for the disabled at the Enable Warehouse of Madison County on Andrew Jackson Way. Tools, equipment and materials will be provided, and activities involve measuring, cutting and building two to three wheelchair ramps.
They are also sponsoring a gardening detail to feed the elderly and homebound at 4725 Bob Wallace Ave., adjacent to Huntsville’s Botanical Garden. Volunteer participation involves mulching, weeding and planting.
Edmonds said most people do not realize Blue Origin’s true mission is to make it inexpensive enough to leverage the solar system for resources from space and preserve the planet.
“That’s really all we are trying to do,” said Edmonds. “Anything we need to preserve the planet – not leave it, but preserve it forever, can be found in infinite amounts in our solar system.
“We would not have to mine anything on Earth and there would be no pollution-generating factories.
“But the problem is it is so expensive to get there.
“Blue Origin’s goal is to make it cheap enough, to make our rockets reusable and cheap enough to access those resources in space and make it cheap enough to get infinite energy, infinite water, and infinite minerals from the solar system and we can preserve the planet forever.”
Click here to download the Blue Origin flyer with the race route, parking details and more information about Earth Day events.
Don’t miss out! Subscribe to our email newsletter to have all our smart stories delivered to your inbox.
