Jared Isaacman, the billionaire entrepreneur in charge of the mission, and Sarah Gillis, a SpaceX engineer, successfully conducted the first commercial spacewalk early Thursday.
This milestone is part of the Polaris Dawn mission, a joint effort between SpaceX and Isaacman.
The spacewalk involved exiting the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule through a top hatch after the cabin air was removed.
Isaacman first performed mobility tests in his spacesuit, followed by Gillis. The remaining crew members, Scott Poteet and Anna Menon, stayed inside to manage life-support systems and monitor the spacewalk.
This mission marks a significant step in commercial space exploration, aiming to advance technology for potential future missions to Mars.
The spacewalks were brief and performed cautiously, as there is no airlock in the Crew Dragon. The mission also demonstrates the feasibility of commercial spacewalks for tasks like satellite repairs.
The spacewalks were carefully planned to avoid decompression sickness, with the crew breathing pure oxygen to eliminate nitrogen from their blood. While spacewalks are risky, they have historically been safe, with no serious injuries reported.
The Polaris Dawn mission, launched on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, reached an orbit of up to 755 miles above Earth, the highest since the Apollo moon missions.
The crew conducted experiments on the effects of weightlessness and radiation and tested communication with Starlink satellites.
