The historic Inspiration4 space mission has successfully reached orbit after lifting off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida shortly after 8:00PM EDT, entering its orbital trajectory at 8:12PM EDT. The three day mission is the first all-civilian space flight in history.
The mission, which was contracted from SpaceX by billionaire entrepreneur Jared Isaacman (who is also a trained pilot with over 6,000 hours flight time and who is also the mission's commander), is also crewed by geoscientist and science communicator Dr. Sian Proctor, childhood cancer survivor and physician assistant Hayley Arceneaux, and data scientist Chris Sembroski.
The mission was launched to raise money and awareness for St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital, which treats childhood cancers and other pediatric diseases at no cost to patients' families.
As of the time of this writing, the YouTube livestream of the launch alone has raised $379,993 from viewers.
The four civilian astronauts are riding aboard SpaceX's Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft, a modified version of the standard Crew Dragon capsule that ferries astronauts to the International Space Station.
Unfortunately, we weren't able to see the opening of the Resilience's nose cone, which would expose the docking mechanism a standard Crew Dragon uses to connect with the International Space Station but which is instead equipped with a special window-like bubble called a cupola that provides the Inspiration4 crew with a 360 degree view of space while in orbit.
Hi, I am Dr. Sian Proctor & I’m a geoscience professor. I’ll be launching into space in 8 days w/ my @inspiration4x crew. I’m looking forward to capturing amazing views of Earth from our @SpaceX cupola.👩🏾🚀🚀🌏#BlackInGeoscienceRollCall #BiGWeek2021 #BIMS #WomenInSTEM #BiGDiversity pic.twitter.com/bW2MUYBQEVSeptember 8, 2021
The problem appears to be a downlink communication issue, but the mission is still on track. After its three days in orbit, it will return to Earth and splash down in the Atlantic Ocean.
Speaking of, the first stage booster of the Falcon 9, which has flown into space twice before tonight, successfully landed on a SpaceX drone ship off the Florida coast and is on its way back to the mainland.
This story is developing...
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