SpaceX pushes launch of daring Polaris Dawn mission back to Wednesday. Meet the 4-person crew spearheading it

Source: CNN

SpaceX pushes launch of daring Polaris Dawn mission back to Wednesday. Meet the 4-person crew spearheading it

By Jackie Wattles, CNN
10 minute read
Updated 10:55 PM EDT, Mon August 26, 2024

(CNN) — SpaceX’s latest attempt to push the cosmic boundaries is set to kick off this week with a mission called Polaris Dawn: a nail-biting, five-day trek to orbit with a crew of private astronauts traveling into Earth’s radiation belts and hoping to conduct the first commercial spacewalk.

The mission is slated to take off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida between 3:38 and 7:09 a.m. ET Wednesday — a 24-hour delay from the company’s previous launch target — carrying four civilians on the daring excursion.

SpaceX said in a social media post Monday evening that it pushed the launch time back in order to take “a closer look at a ground-side helium leak” on a piece a equipment designed to detach from the rocket during takeoff.

It will mark the second trip to space for Jared Isaacman, the billionaire founder of payments platform company Shift4. He made a less risky journey in 2021 on a mission dubbed Inspiration4.

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Read more: https://edition.cnn.com/2024/08/26/science/polaris-dawn-crew-spacex-jared-isaacman/index.html