SpaceX pushes first private spacewalk mission

The company SpaceX has postponed the attempt to launch an expedition consisting of a civilian crew, which will carry out the first private spacewalk.

It's a mission called Polaris Dawn that was supposed to launch yesterday from NASA's space center in Florida, but hours before the launch, SpaceX chief Elon Musk said the launch was delayed due to the weather forecast. unfavorable in the capsule landing area.

The date of the new launch attempt is not yet known as the flight was also canceled due to a helium leak in the line connecting the tower to the rocket, the BBC reports.

Behind this mission is the billionaire Jared Isaacman, who founded the company Shift4. His goal is to become the first non-professional astronaut to perform a spacewalk. He organized and financed most of the project with SpaceX, but did not disclose how much money he spent.

Project Polaris uses SpaceX's Dragon capsule mounted atop a Falcon 9 rocket.

The mission plan includes reaching an altitude of 1400 kilometers, which is also the highest altitude a crew will reach since NASA's Apollo program more than 50 years ago.

The aforementioned businessman is also the captain of the crew, which also includes his close friend and former US Air Force pilot Scott Poteet, as well as two SpaceX engineers, Anna Menon and Sarah Gillis. All four of them have been training for the mission for two years and have spent thousands of hours conducting simulated exercises.

Isaacman has traveled to space before, in 2021 when he paid $200 million to be part of SpaceX's first civilian orbital mission called Inspiration4.

As part of the Polaris Dawn mission, the crew will spend six days in space, with a spacewalk planned for the third day. All passengers will wear upgraded SpaceX suits equipped with helmet-mounted displays and cameras. Isaacman and Gillis will then exit the spacecraft at an altitude of 700 kilometers and the walk will take two hours.

The crew was prepared to perform several altitude tests, including communications with Starlink Internet satellites, observations of the effects of passing through the Van Allen radiation belt, a highly charged region of space. /Telegraph/