How Polaris Dawn Is Continuing The Positive Work Started By Inspiration4
SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket will launch Polaris Dawn on the Dragon capsule by the fourth quarter of 2022. The Polaris Dawn mission is the first of three under the Polaris Program. Named after the constellation of three stars more commonly known as the North Star, its goal is to continue to make space exploration more accessible while simultaneously using its name and influence to raise funds and awareness for St. Jude's Children Research Hospital.
Elon Musk's mantra of space exploration is cheaper, safer, and more accessible. The decades when NASA called the shots on what programs to develop with outrageously inflated budgets, and how much money they'd pour into select congressional districts are dwindling away. The nostalgic past of Apollo heroes is becoming a future of riskier new ideas that were once frowned upon. Now there is not only competition but also collaboration, and both are key elements for innovation and sustainability in any industry. After many years, human spaceflight will break again the glass ceiling of lower Earth's orbit, which is only a few kilometers away. The next era of space exploration is right around the corner and SpaceX, against all odds, has changed the game.
Related: Artemis I: Mission Launch Date And What Happens Before Then
Last year, SpaceX launched Inspiration 4, the first civilian mission of its kind where four crew members flew aboard Dragon and orbited Earth for three days. Jared Isaacman, a self-made billionaire, owner of Shift4Payments and accomplished jet pilot, was Mission Commander. Isaacman and Musk had begun talks a few years earlier to fund a private mission to space. The project eventually took off and Isaacman's Inspiration4 flight mates were selected based on four "pillars"
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