SpaceX to launch world's first all-civilian mission

SpaceX will launch four private individuals into Earth’s orbit on its Crew Dragon capsule in late 2021, announced CEO Elon Musk on Monday. This will be the world’s first all civilian astronaut mission called Inspiration4.

The mission will be commanded by the company’s technology entrepreneur Jared Isaacman who is also a trained pilot will raise support for St Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

“Jared Isaacman, founder and CEO of Shift4 Payments, is donating the three seats alongside him aboard Dragon to individuals from the general public who will be announced in the weeks ahead,” a statement issued by the company read.

“The Inspiration4 crew will receive commercial astronaut training by SpaceX on the Falcon 9 launch vehicle and Dragon spacecraft, orbital mechanics, operating in microgravity, zero gravity, and other forms of stress testing. They will go through emergency preparedness training, spacesuit and spacecraft ingress and egress exercises, as well as partial and full mission simulations,” it added.

The mission is planned for two to four days will be carefully monitored by mission control and will orbit the planet every 90 minutes in a customised flight path, it said. On concluding mission, the spacecraft will go for soft water landing off the Florida coast.

SpaceX to launch world’s first all-civilian mission