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the dragon spacecraft launched by space exploration technology company on the 10th will carry out a spacewalk mission on the 12th, which will be completed by two crew members. if the mission is successful, they will become the first non-professional astronauts to complete a spacewalk, thus opening a new chapter in commercial space travel.

the crew of the polaris dawn mission. from left, anna menon, kidd poteet, jared isaacman and sarah gillies.

jared isaacman, a 41-year-old american billionaire, will conduct a spacewalk with sarah gillis, an engineer from space exploration technologies corporation. according to the associated press, unlike previous spacewalk missions in which astronauts floated a considerable distance outside the international space station, isaacman and gillis will only be considered to have conducted a spacewalk if they leave the dragon spacecraft and exit the cabin.

at that time, the two will take turns to go out of the cabin, and each person will stay outside the cabin for 15 to 20 minutes. for safety reasons, during the space "walk", they will always keep one hand or foot on the ladder-like support structure on the outer wall of the spacecraft, and a 3.6-meter-long rope will connect them to the spacecraft. however, they will not hover at the end of the rope.

the other two crew members on the spacecraft, kidd poteet and anna menon, will monitor the entire process from inside the cabin. unlike larger spacecraft, the dragon spacecraft does not have an airlock. once the hatch is opened, the entire cabin will be in a depressurized environment. although poteet and menon are in the cabin, they will also wear extravehicular activity space suits designed by spacex during the mission.

the entire spacewalk mission is expected to take no more than two hours.

on september 10th local time, the dragon spacecraft was launched from the kennedy space center in florida.

isaacman and four others boarded the dragon spacecraft on the 10th to enter space, reaching a maximum altitude of about 1,400 kilometers from the earth, to carry out a space mission codenamed "north star dawn". the spacecraft later descended to an altitude of about 700 kilometers from the earth, and the crew will carry out a spacewalk mission at this altitude. the orbital altitude of the international space station is about 400 kilometers from the earth.

isaacman and the other four are not professional astronauts. isaacman is the founder and ceo of the us payment service provider "shift4pay", poteet is a retired fighter pilot, and menon and gillis are engineers at space exploration technologies corporation.

according to the associated press, since soviet cosmonaut alexi leonov's first spacewalk in 1965, 263 people have completed spacewalks, all of them professional astronauts.

isaacman refused to disclose how much he spent on the space mission. he went into space on the dragon spacecraft in september 2021 and returned after about three days of orbiting the earth. he was one of the crew members of space exploration technology company's "all-civilian" space "tour group".

spacex is the first private company to attempt a commercial spacewalk mission. retired nasa astronaut chris cassidy said that compared to getting passengers into a spacecraft, buckling up their seat belts and traveling to and from space, conducting a spacewalk mission is a completely different "game" that is more difficult and more dangerous.