Two passengers from SpaceX’s Polaris Dawn mission venture outside the spacecraft

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The spacewalk officially began when oxygen began flowing into the astronauts’ suits, SpaceX announced during a livestream of the event. The Polaris Dawn mission was launched under the leadership of billionaire Jared Isaacman.

As the capsule’s hatch opened, the 41-year-old businessman briefly ventured out of the ship. A live video feed from the company shows him emerging from the capsule in his white and gray jumpsuit, holding onto a metal structure set up for the occasion. It’s beautiful ” he said, at an altitude of about 700 km, or 300 km higher than the International Space Station (ISS).

Sarah Gillis then took over, and also made moves to test SpaceX’s brand new suits, the first intended for spacewalks — one of the mission’s main objectives. She then in turn returned to the interior of the ship to prepare to close the hatch.

Two other passengers, pilot Scott Poteet and fellow SpaceX employee Anna Menon, are also aboard the Dragon capsule, and are also exposed to the vacuum of space. The spacewalk is expected to last about two hours — much shorter than government agency astronauts’ walks outside the ISS, where they also perform highly technical tasks.

Testing the combinations

The four crew members have undergone more than two years of training to prepare for this historic mission. Beyond their spacewalk, they must also test satellite laser communications between the spacecraft and SpaceX’s Starlink satellites and carry out around forty scientific experiments.

But the main objective of the mission is above all to test the suits of the four adventurers. They are also equipped with a camera, and information on the pressure, temperature and humidity of the suit is directly displayed in the helmet. SpaceX hopes to be able to produce ” millions “, in order to enable humanity to become a multi-planetary species – its stated goal. Someday someone might wear a version of this on March “, so it is ” a great honor » to test them, said Jared Isaacman, boss of the financial company Shift4.

Polaris Dawn marks a new milestone in commercial space exploration, with its commander Jared Isaacman championing the usefulness of private investments to accelerate the conquest of the cosmos. Polaris Dawn inaugurates the Polaris program, announced two and a half years ago and which is to include three missions. After a second similar to the one currently underway, the third should be the first crewed flight of SpaceX’s Starship mega-rocket, currently in development and intended for trips to the Moon and Mars.

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