For the longest time, humans have been obsessed with space, trying to observe, explore and understand it. But now history’s been made after Elon Musk’s SpaceX launched the first all-civilian flight.
This year has seen an actual race to space, with billionaires all making history in unique ways.
On Wednesday, September 15, the world witnessed a historic moment in space travel, the launch of the first non-professional crew to orbit planet Earth for a total of three days.
But that isn’t the only thing that makes it special. Inspiration4 has on board the first Black female pilot of a spaceflight, the youngest American, and the first person with a prosthesis, as a significant portion of Hayley Arceneaux’s leg is metal.
Instead of a docking hatch, the Dragon Capsule has been outfitted with a cupola unique to this flight, modified to give its passengers the views of their lives. Talk about iconic.
It’s also the first time there’ll be three Dragon capsules in orbit, SpaceX senior director of human spaceflight Benji Reed told CNBC: “This is significant and historic because it’s going to be the highest that any humans have gone into orbit since the Hubble servicing missions. Another historic part for SpaceX is that this will be the first time that we have three in orbit.”
Photo: SpaceX
Billionaire entrepreneur Jared Isaacman, founder and CEO of Shift4 Payments and a seasoned pilot, is the mission commander for this space trip. The 38-year-old purchased the three-day flight from SpaceX for an undisclosed fee, but the goal is to raise awareness and funding for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
The crew consists of Isaacman, mission specialist Chris Sembroski, Dr. Sian Proctor, geoscientist and science communication specialist, and Hayley Arceneaux, medical officer.
The capsule has reached an altitude 363 miles (584 km), and is currently orbiting Earth, traveling at over 17,000 miles per hour (27,360 kph). It reached higher altitudes than the International Space Station, besting Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin and Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic missions, who were in space for less than fifteen minutes.
The three-day orbital space trip represents Elon Musk’s company’s fourth mission since they started carrying people to space less than a year and a half ago. The first operational flight, Crew-1 took place in late 2020, and the most recent, Crew-2, occurred in April this year. The first crewed flight was Demo-2, carried astronauts into orbit in May 2020.
Photo: SpaceX
SpaceX is under contract with NASA, and has another mission, Crew-3, scheduled at the end of next month, and a private deal with Axiom Space to the International Space Station to begin early next year.
While there is no live feed from the capsule currently in orbit, we will be able to see pictures and videos over the next three days. The official Twitter account for SpaceX just released some stunning images the Dragon capsule, the cupola giving its passengers one-of-a-kind views of planet Earth. The 14-second video shows the capsule orbiting around the Earth, making it an all-time goals trip.
Following the release, the official account for Virgin Galactic congratulated SpaceX (tweet attached below), writing: “Congratulations on a successful launch into orbit. Enjoy the view @inspiration4 x!” Blue Origin, however, has not commented on the launch yet.
This historic launch marks the possibility of tourism beyond the atmosphere, space proving to be the ultimate vacation spot for those who can afford it.
Given how planes were considered a luxury not too long ago, we could expect the commercialization of low-Earth orbit, and, in the near future, non-billionaire civilians might be able to catch a glimpse of our dear planet from a spacecraft, just like Inspiration4 did.
Imagine a Wenn diagram for cars and celebrities. At the intersection you'll find Monica, putting her passion for these fields and English-Spanish double major to work. She's been doing for the past seven years, most recently at autoevolution. Full profile
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