Billionaire entrepreneur Jared Isaacman has become the first astronaut to walk in space during a private space mission.
When Jared Isaacman stepped out of the private spacecraft Polaris Dawn on Thursday, his helmet camera was filming live. In such a situation, the first words that came out of his mouth were: ‘Hussein Dunya. Well, we all have a lot to do on Earth, but right now Earth looks like a perfect world from here.’
Isaacman was followed by SpaceX engineer Sarah Gillis from the spacecraft for a spacewalk.
After a few minutes of spacewalk, the two astronauts went back inside their spacecraft. Both astronauts completed their mission at a distance of 435 miles from Earth. However, Polaris Dawn is still two days away from returning to Earth.
Polaris Dawn A ‘Dangerous’ Private Space Mission
SpaceX’s new space mission suit
On Tuesday, the private space mission ‘Polaris Dawn’ was successfully launched on its journey by SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from the southeastern state of Florida, USA.
In addition to billionaire businessman Jared Isaacman, the spacecraft is also carrying a retired pilot, Scott ‘Kid’ Poteet, and two SpaceX engineers, Anna Menon and Sarah Gillis.
This spacecraft named ‘Resilience’ entered the space at a distance of 1400 km from the earth. No human has traveled this far from Earth since the end of NASA’s Apollo program in the 1970s.
During their journey, the astronauts will also pass through a region of space known as the ‘Van Allen Belt’, where there is a lot of radiation, but the advanced spacesuits of the spacecraft and crew will protect them from it.
In just a few passes through the area, they would be exposed to as much radiation as astronauts living on the International Space Station in three months, which is within acceptable limits.
The purpose of this trip is also to study the short-term effects of radiation on the human body.
Resilience’s passengers will spend their second day in space at the highest altitude and will conduct about 40 experiments during that time, including intersatellite laser communications between the Dragon spacecraft and SpaceX’s collection of Starlink satellites.
The mission successfully took off from Florida yesterday
Set a new record
As everything is going according to plan on this mission so far and Isaacman and Sarah Gillis’ spacewalk has set a new record.
This walk was done at an altitude of 700 km in orbit. The astronauts also tested their new spacesuits, which are designed to work outside the spacecraft. It is an improved version of SpaceX’s Intravehicular Activity (IVA) suite.
A unique aspect of this spacewalk is that the spacecraft does not have an airlock that acts as a sealed chamber between the entrance to outer space and the rest of the spacecraft.
Airlocks are normally depressurized before astronauts enter and exit, but in the case of Resilience, the entire spacecraft will be depressurized and the astronauts will have to be fully equipped regardless of the spacecraft. Don’t even get out.
The spacecraft is designed to withstand vacuum and is equipped with additional nitrogen and oxygen tanks. Although only two astronauts exited the spacecraft, all four astronauts were wearing EVA suits.
The mission will thus break the record for the largest number of people in the vacuum of space at the same time.
The flight team will use the mission to study the effects of decompression on astronauts, as well as to test for blurred vision, as astronauts can sometimes suffer from blurred vision in space. This condition is called spaceflight-associated neuro-ocular syndrome.
Testing the effects of radiation in the Van Allen Belt and spacewalks are intended to lay the groundwork for future private sector missions to higher altitudes and possibly to the Moon or Mars.
