Polaris Dawn

Key facts

Mission & specifications

Mission

Polaris Dawn was the most ambitious private spaceflight yet attempted — a mission bought, planned and commanded not by a space agency but by an entrepreneur, that pushed a commercial crew farther than any had gone before. It was the first of three planned flights in the Polaris Program funded by Jared Isaacman, who had already flown the all-civilian Inspiration4 mission in 2021. Launched on 10 September 2024 on a SpaceX Crew Dragon, the four-person crew — Isaacman, retired Air Force pilot Scott Poteet, and SpaceX engineers Sarah Gillis and Anna Menon — first raised their orbit to about 1,400 kilometres, farther from Earth than anyone had travelled since the Apollo Moon missions, passing through part of the hazardous Van Allen radiation belts to study their effects. The mission's centrepiece came on the third day: the first spacewalk ever conducted by a private crew. Crew Dragon has no airlock, so the entire capsule had to be depressurised and opened to the vacuum, exposing all four crew members to space at once. Wearing newly developed SpaceX extravehicular suits — a slimmer design meant one day to be mass-produced for Moon and Mars missions — Isaacman and then Gillis each climbed partway out to test the suit's mobility. Gillis, at 30, became one of the youngest people and the first SpaceX employee to walk in space. The crew also tested laser links to SpaceX's Starlink satellites and ran dozens of health experiments before splashing down on 15 September 2024. Polaris Dawn showed that private missions were no longer just tourism — they were now flying farther, testing new hardware and performing feats once reserved for national space programmes.

1. 2024Launch on Crew DragonLaunch

   The private Polaris Dawn crew lifts off for a five-day free-flyer mission.

2. 2024Highest orbit since ApolloMilestone

   The crew reaches ~1,400 km, farther from Earth than anyone since the Moon missions, crossing the Van Allen belts.

3. 2024First commercial spacewalkMilestone

   Isaacman and Gillis test new SpaceX EVA suits with the whole capsule open to vacuum.

4. 2024SplashdownMission end

   Polaris Dawn returns after five days, the most ambitious private flight yet.

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