Historic First: Polaris Dawn Astronauts Achieve Milestone with Private Spacewalk

[Social Media]

 

Polaris Dawn has once again made history with SpaceX’s private crew of four astronauts performing the world’s first commercial spacewalk on September 12. During the third day of their five-day journey in Earth’s orbit, the crew, led by Polaris Dawn commander Jared Isaacman, executed this unprecedented feat while soaring high above the planet.

Billionaire Jared Isaacman has become the first person to complete a private spacewalk.

The SpaceX Polaris Dawn spacewalk was labelled a 'highly risky mission'.

More: https://t.co/vRFSdeAfxy pic.twitter.com/ScjCxnY4VT

— Sky News (@SkyNews) September 12, 2024

 

"SpaceX, back at home we have a lot of work to do, but from here it looks like a perfect world," Isaacman, the American billionaire who financed the mission, remarked as he gazed down on Earth while standing mostly outside the Dragon hatch.

Polaris Dawn's Mission Commander @rookisaacman has completed his suit mobility tests and is now back inside Dragon pic.twitter.com/oyEvjEKfRo

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) September 12, 2024

SpaceX launched the crew, consisting of Isaacman, pilot Scott "Kidd" Poteet, and mission specialists Sarah Gillis and Anna Menon, into orbit on September 10. The launch took place at NASA's historic Launch Complex-39A at Kennedy Space Center, the same site that hosted Apollo 11, the first mission to land humans on the moon. 

 

 

Just fifteen hours after liftoff, the Polaris Dawn crew made their first bit of space history, reaching an altitude of 870 miles (1,400.7 kilometers), higher than any crewed mission since the Apollo program. This broke the previous record held by NASA's Gemini 11 mission, which reached 853 miles (1,373 kilometers). However, Polaris Dawn didn’t stop there. After reaching this record altitude, the Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft lowered to 458 miles (737 kilometers) at its highest point, allowing for the spacewalk.

 

 

The spacewalk began at 6:12 a.m. EDT, about four hours later than originally scheduled. Isaacman was the first to exit the spacecraft at 6:48 a.m. EDT, followed by Sarah Gillis at 7:04 a.m. EDT. The spacewalk, which lasted one hour and 46 minutes, involved both astronauts performing a series of spacesuit mobility checks. The live broadcast by SpaceX captured stunning views of the astronauts standing up, with most of their bodies outside the spacecraft. "Whew! Smell that? Space," Isaacman quipped after the Dragon hatch was closed and the capsule began its repressurization process. "Nice job for everyone at SpaceX who made it possible."

 

The success of the spacewalk was made possible by several specialized pieces of hardware developed for the Polaris Dawn mission. The crew donned newly designed EVA suits by SpaceX, which were engineered to be both lightweight and flexible, while still offering protection against the harsh environment of Earth's orbit. A SpaceX spacesuit engineer described the suit as "a suit of armor made of fabric." Testing these suits was one of Polaris Dawn’s primary goals, with the intention of using them for a variety of future missions. Isaacman reflected on the significance of this testing: "It's not lost on us that, you know, it might be 10 iterations from now and a bunch of evolutions of the suit, but that, someday, someone could be wearing a version of [it] that might be walking on Mars."

 

 

In addition to testing the new spacesuits, the Polaris Dawn crew has been conducting 36 different science experiments, provided by 31 separate institutions. These experiments aim to contribute valuable data to NASA's Human Research Program, helping scientists better understand how the human body reacts to spaceflight.

 

Credit: Space X 2024-09-13

 

 

 

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[expat_4_life]

5 hours ago, Social Media said:

Polaris Dawn has once again made history with SpaceX’s private crew of four astronauts performing the world’s first commercial spacewalk on September 12.

 

SpaceX, picking up where NASA left off over five decades ago, getting closer to the visions we had then of human achievement in space.  I recall being a member of PanAm's First Moon Flights Club back in the 60's - enthusiasm was high.

Looking forward to other firsts with the SpaceX plans to launch and test colonization concepts on Mars in 2026 that were recently announced.  Godspeed SpaceX. 

Edited September 13 by expat_4_life

[PETERTHEEATER]

Not so much a spacewalk as a turtles head.

[WDSmart]

Another horrific waste of money and resources. We should be trying to fix or at least lessen all the problems we've caused on this planet before working on technology focussed on taking us to another one.