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The Fram2 crew will become the first people to view the planet’s polar regions from orbit as they fly 273 mi. above Earth and inclined 90 deg.
CAPE CANAVERAL—SpaceX launched its third free-flying space charter on March 31, sending a quartet of adventurers into polar orbit, a first for a human spaceflight.
Strapped into the Dragon spacecraft was cryptocurrency entrepreneur Chun Wang, a Chinese-born citizen of Malta. He organized and financed the expedition, known as Fram2.
The mission takes its name from the 19th-century Norwegian Fram ship that traveled to the poles beginning in the 1800s. A piece of the original Fram ship deck is flying onboard Dragon.
Wang, a seasoned world traveler, invited three crewmates to join him for the planned 3.5-day Fram2 mission, which lifted off at 9:47 p.m. EDT March 31 from the Kennedy Space Center. The crew includes Norwegian cinematographer Jannicke Mikkelsen, who is serving as commander, German roboticist Rabea Rogge, who is the Dragon pilot, and Australian Eric Philips, a polar explorer and adventure tour guide.
The Fram2 crew will become the first people to view the planet’s polar regions from orbit as they fly 273 mi. above Earth and inclined 90 deg. relative to the equator. Previously, the highest-inclination human spaceflight was the 1963 Soviet-era Vostok 6 mission that orbited 65 deg.
In addition to photographing the planet and auroral displays, the Fram2 crew plans to oversee 22 science experiments that include taking the first x-ray images of the human body in space.
SpaceX also outfitted Dragon with a Starlink laser terminal that is expected to provide the crew with high-speed data relay of about 100 GB per second.
To reach polar orbit from Florida—a trajectory SpaceX reopened in 2020 after a 50-year hiatus—the Falcon 9 rocket carrying the Fram2 crew flew due south from Cape Canaveral along Florida’s Atlantic coast, passing over Miami, Cuba and Panama as it headed into space.
The mission is expected to end with the Dragon capsule splashing down in the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of southern California, on April 4.
Fram2 follows the September 2021 Inspiration 4 and the 2024 Polaris Dawn private spaceflights, both of which were financed and commanded by entrepreneur Jared Isaacman. President Donald Trump has nominated Isaacman to become the new administrator of NASA.
SpaceX also has flown 14 crews to and from the International Space Station, including 11 for NASA and three missions for Houston-based Axiom Space.
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