SpaceX just marked another milestone in the history of manned spaceflight



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Four SpaceX tourists returned to Earth safely on Saturday after spending three days in space, successfully concluding the first orbital mission in history without a professional astronaut on board.

The SpaceX Dragon capsule, whose heat shield enabled it to resist descent, was slowed down by four large parachutes before crashing into the Atlantic Ocean off Florida at 7:06 p.m. (11:06 p.m. GMT), according to a video feed. of the company.

“It was a hell of a ride for us, and we’re just getting started,” said billionaire captain Jared Isaacman, who funded the trip in an effort to make space a little more accessible, shortly after the landing.

A SpaceX ship immediately retrieved the capsule, before its hatch was opened and the space tourists, smiling broadly and waving their arms in the air, exited one by one.

They then headed to the Kennedy Space Center, where their mission began on Wednesday.

The stated objective of the mission, dubbed Inspiration4, was to encourage the democratization of space by proving that the cosmos is accessible to crews who have not been handpicked or in training for years.

“Congratulations @ Inspiration4x !!!” SpaceX founder Elon Musk tweeted after landing.

The four space novices – Isaacman and three other Americans – spent three days orbiting Earth, traveling beyond the International Space Station (ISS), to an orbit of about 575 kilometers (357 miles) from high, and circling the globe more than 15 times each. daytime.

Isaacman, who paid SpaceX tens of millions of dollars, offered the other three seats to strangers: Hayley Arceneaux, a 29-year-old nurse; Sian Proctor, a 51-year-old teacher; and Chris Sembroski, 42, a US Air Force veteran.

However, the exact price that the 38-year-old Shift4 Payments founder and veteran pilot paid for the mission has not been revealed.

The Inspiration4 crew bonded over a six-month training course, compared to years for professional astronauts.

During the flight, limb vital signs, including heart rate, sleep, blood oxygen levels, and cognitive abilities, were monitored to study the effects of space on complete novices.

But they also enjoyed the view through a brand new observation dome installed on the capsule, spoke with actor Tom Cruise from the ship, ate pizza, and listened to music.

Second space age

“Welcome to the second space age,” mission director Todd Ericson said at a post-landing press conference.

With its completion, “space travel becomes much more accessible to average men and women.”

There was only one minor issue during the flight, with the capsule’s toilet system, but a solution was quickly found, Ericson said, without giving further details.

“Best ride of my life! ” Proctor tweeted after the capsule comes out.

The mission served as a huge fundraiser for St Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital, a premier facility in Tennessee. Arceneaux was treated there as a child and works there today.

The crew took with them various items – including a ukulele, which Sembroski briefly played live from the ship on Friday – which will now be auctioned off with the proceeds going to the hospital.

The landing marked the third time Musk’s company has taken humans to space and back, after returning from two NASA missions, one in August 2020 and the other in May of this year. Both were bringing astronauts back from a trip to the ISS.

Unlike the NASA astronauts, the Inspiration4 mission members did not visit the ISS but remained in orbit around the Earth.

The space adventure comes after a summer marked by the battle of billionaires Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos to reach the last frontier. However, their separate suborbital flights only offered a few minutes in zero gravity.

SpaceX is already planning other space tourism flights. In fact, “the number of people contacting us through our sales and marketing portals has increased dramatically,” said Benji Reed, director of human spaceflight programs at SpaceX.

The next trip is scheduled for January 2022, with three businessmen on board.

© Agence France-Presse



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