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Elon Musk’s SpaceX plans to send its first “fully civilian” crew to space in late 2021 on a charitable mission commissioned by tech entrepreneur Jared Isaacman. The company said in a press release that it would choose three people to climb alongside Isaacman to orbit on SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule.
Isaacman, a qualified pilot and managing director of Shift4 Payments, has donated $ 100 million to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, he said in a press release. He also plans to donate the remaining three Crew Dragon seats for the trip to those “who will be selected to represent the pillars of the mission of leadership, hope, generosity and prosperity.” SpaceX in a separate statement said the seats would go “to members of the general public to be announced in the coming weeks.”
The mission, named Inspiration4, will be launched from SpaceX Launch Site 39A stationed at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The crew will launch atop the company’s Falcon 9 rocket and receive special training from SpaceX, with “particular emphasis on orbital mechanics, operating in microgravity, zero gravity and other forms of stress testing.”
The crew of four will spend a few days in the acorn-shaped Crew Dragon capsule as it orbits Earth every 90 minutes “along a custom flight path,” SpaceX said.
SpaceX has already launched two crews into space, but these were accompanied by trained NASA astronauts – including a Japanese space agency astronaut – on government-funded trips to the International Space Station. The Inspiration4 mission marks SpaceX’s second fully private mission to be announced. The company’s next Ax-1 mission will host a crew of four private astronauts paying $ 55 million each for an eight-day trip to the ISS.
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