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IPFS News Link • Space Travel and Exploration

SpaceX Polaris Dawn private spacewalk mission: Live updates

• https://www.space.com, By Tariq Malik

SpaceX's Polaris Dawn mission will launch American billionaire Jared Isaacman and three others on a five-day flight to attempt the world's first private spacewalk. The mission is the first of three Polaris Program spaceflights with SpaceX, and the second personally financed by Isaacman.

The Polaris Dawn mission is scheduled to launch on Aug. 26 at 3:38 a.m. EDT (0738 GMT) during a four-hour launch window. It will fly on a Falcon 9 rocket and the Crew Dragon capsule Resilience, making its third flight. Isaacman will serve as mission commander; with US Air Force Lt. Col (retired) Scott "Kidd" Poteet as pilot; Sarah Gillis, SpaceX lead space operations engineer for astronaut training, as mission specialist; and Anna Menon, SpaceX lead operations engineer for crew operations development, as mission specialist and medical officer.

The four private astronauts of SpaceX's Polaris Dawn mission are a week away from launch after two years of training for a mission that, they hope, will include the world's first private spacewalk. 

American billionaire Jared Isaacman, who previously backed his private Inspiration4 spaceflight with SpaceX, will command the Polaris Dawn mission, the first of three new spaceflights he's purchased from SpaceX. 

Isaacman, pilot Scott "Kidd" Poteet, and mission specialists Sarah Gillis and Anna Menon, both Lead Space Operations Engineers at SpaceX, arrived at their launch site at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida on Aug. 19. Liftoff is set for Aug. 26 at 3:38 a.m. EDT (0738 GMT)

The mission, announced in 2022, will test new spacesuits for SpaceX during a planned 2-hour spacewalk during the five-day mission. On Aug. 19, the crew spoke with reporters about their upcoming mission. 

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