Former aviator Wally Funk, 82, will join Amazon founder and space enthusiast Jeff Bezos, his brother and the winner of a public auction on the trip to space. Funk will travel as an “honoured guest” in recognition of her "pioneering work in aviation", said Bezos on Thursday.

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Bezos shared the news with a video post on Instagram.

Bezos-owned Blue Origin’s New Shepard spaceship, which flies by automation, will make its first crewed flight on July 20.

July 20 is the 52nd anniversary of Apollo 11 moon landing.

Who is Wally Funk?

Funk was the first female air safety investigator for the National Transportation Safety Board, the first female flight instructor at a US military base, and the first female inspector for the Federal Aviation Administration.

In the 1960s, Funk and 12 other women joined the Mercury 13 programme — an unofficial and privately funded programme that gave women the same training as the male astronauts undergoing the official NASA programme.

Funk was the best in her batch.

"They told me that I had done better and completed the work faster than any of the guys. So I got hold of NASA four times. I said I want to become an astronaut, but nobody would take me. I didn't think that I would ever get to go up," said Funk, according to The Telegraph report.

Following the Mercury 13 programme, she undertook training at Star City in Russia, where the country trains its cosmonauts.

"It's time," Bezos wrote on the Instagram as he shared a video of the informal announcement. "Welcome to the crew, Wally."

He added, "No one has waited longer."

"I can hardly wait," Funk excitedly said in the video.

In the video, Bezos is telling Funk how the four passengers will experience zero gravity for a few minutes and then land gently. Then he asks her, "You step outside. What's the first thing you say?"

"I will say — Honey, that was the best thing that ever happened to me!" Funk said.

At 82, Funk will become the oldest person to travel to space. This record is currently held by US astronaut John Glenn, who flew in 1998 at the age of 77 on the space shuttle Discovery. The first woman in space was Russia's Valentina Tereshkova. She flew in 1963, 20 years before the first American woman, Sally Ride, in 1983.

The New Shepard trip will take 11 minutes after the rocket takes off from a desert in western Texas. Those aboard will go above the Karman line, which marks the recognized boundary between Earth's atmosphere and space.

After its moments in orbit, providing a few minutes of weightlessness, the vehicle is supposed to float back on parachutes and land upright, according to Daily Mail.

New Shepard, named after the first American in space Alan Shepard, is 59ft high and has room for up to six passengers.

Bezos could become the first billionaire entrepreneur to explore new frontiers of space exploration and travel, but Virgin Galactic’s Richard Branson, who is also trying to explore the domain of space tourism, might achieve the feat before the Amazon boss – as early as on July 4.