The first all-civilian crew – Jared Isaacman, Haley Arcenauex, Sian Proctor and Chris Sembroski – shared new images of their historic Inspiration4 mission in September when they orbited Earth for three days.
The photos show the planet as seen from space, highlighting its round shape against a pitch-black backdrop, puffy clouds swirling in the sky and the sun’s light peaking up from behind the horizon.
The stunning images were captured by the team through the massive glass dome attached to the top of the SpaceX capsule.
The crew launched on September 15 and returned home three days later and even though the mission was successful, the team experienced a few hiccups – some were sick the entire time and a broken toilet spilled urine under the capsule’s floor.
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The Inspiration4 crew shared new images of their historic mission in September when they orbited Earth for three days. Many of the new photos show clouds hanging over our planet’s blue oceans, but one specifically highlights the moon hanging far in the background (pictured)
Inspiration4 is the first all-civilian space mission, which was purchased by Isaacman, who is a self-made billionaire.
It was gifted to Proctor, a community college educator in Arizona, Sembroski, a former Air Force missileman from Washington and Arceneaux, a physician assistant at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Tennessee.
The mission was designed primarily to raise awareness and support for the pediatric cancer center, which successfully treated Arceneaux for bone cancer when she was a child.
The flight aimed to raise $200 million for the hospital, with Isaacman donating $100 million of his own money to the goal and SpaceX founder Elon Musk promised to give $50 million to the cause. Altogether, the Inspiration4 mission raised $210 million.
The team uploaded the images on Monday, all of which capture Earth in its glory.
The Inspiration4 crew – Jared Isaacman (pictured), Haley Arcenauex, Sian Proctor and Chris Sembroski –shared new images of their historic mission in September when they orbited Earth for three days
The photos show our planet as seen from space, highlighting its round shape against a pitch-black backdrop, puffy clouds swirling in the sky and the sun’s light peaking up from behind the horizon
Many of the new photos show clouds hanging over the planet’s oceans, but one specifically highlights the moon hanging in the background.
The team also uploaded new images of themselves inside the capsule.
One shows Isaacman floating in zero-gravity in front of the glass dome while our planet sits in the back.
Proctor, Sembroski and Arceneaux shared a snap of them smiling ear to ear while inside the capsule.
In the image, Arceneaux is holding a plush puppy wearing a spacesuit that is based on two service dogs – Puggle and Huckleberry – that work at the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
The crew launched on September 15 and returned home three days later and even though the mission was successful, the team experienced a few hiccups – some were sick the entire time and a broken toilet spilled urine under the capsule’s floor
Proctor, Sembroski and Arceneaux shared a snap of them smiling ear to ear while inside the capsule. In the image, Arceneaux is holding a plush puppy wearing a spacesuit that is based on two service dogs – Puggle and Huckleberry – that work at the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital
However, for the first two days of the mission Proctor was experiencing a sickness while in the capsule.
And while the team was snapping fun pictures, urine was leaking under the floor of the craft.
The toilet aboard the SpaceX capsule malfunctioned during the trip, releasing bodily fluids under the floor.
William Gerstenmaier, a SpaceX vice president who used to work for NASA, told the New York Times, that the incident was not reported until after the crew had landed and exited the craft.
Inspiration4 is the first all-civilian space mission, which was purchased by Isaacman, who is a self-made billionaire, and gifted to Proctor, a community college educator in Arizona, Sembroski a former Air Force missileman from Washington and Arceneaux, who is a physician assistant at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Tennessee
Urine began leaking from the toilet when a tube came unplugged and pooled beneath the floor panels.
The issue was found on another SpaceX capsule, but this one was docked to the International Space Station (ISS) and was gearing up to bring astronauts back to Earth.
NASA’s Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur, along with the European Space Agency’s Thomas Pesquet and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s astronaut Akihiko Hoshide, were forced to wear diapers during the return trip, as the restroom was out-of-service.
THE BILLIONAIRE SPACE RACE: HOW BRANSON, MUSK AND BEZOS ARE VYING FOR GALACTIC SUPREMACY
Jeff Bezos in front of Blue Origin’s space capsule
Dubbed the ‘NewSpace’ set, Jeff Bezos, Sir Richard Branson and Elon Musk all say they were inspired by the first moon landing in 1969, when the US beat the Soviet Union in the space race, and there is no doubt how much it would mean to each of them to win the ‘new space race’.
Amazon founder Bezos had looked set to be the first of the three to fly to space, having announced plans to launch aboard his space company Blue Origin’s New Shepard spacecraft on July 20, but Branson beat him to the punch.
The British billionaire became Virgin Galactic Astronaut 001 when he made it to space on a suborbital flight nine days before Bezos – on July 11 in a test flight.
Bezos travelled to space on July 20 with his younger brother Mark, Oliver Daemen, an 18-year-old physics student whose dad purchased his ticket, and pioneering female astronaut Wally Funk, 82.
Although SpaceX and Tesla founder Musk has said he wants to go into space, and even ‘die on Mars’, he has not said when he might blast into orbit – but has purchased a ticket with Virgin Galactic for a suborbital flight.
SpaceX became the first of the ‘space tourism’ operators to send a fully civilian crew into orbit, with the Inspiration4 mission funded by billionaire Jared Isaacman.
His flight was on a Dragon capsule and SpaceX rocket built by space-obsessed billionaire, Elon Musk and took off for the three day orbital trip on September 16 – going higher than the International Space Station.
SpaceX appears to be leading the way in the broader billionaire space race with numerous launches carrying NASA equipment to the ISS and partnerships to send tourists to space by 2021.
On February 6 2018, SpaceX sent rocket towards the orbit of Mars, 140 million miles away, with Musk’s own red Tesla roadster attached.
Elon Musk with his Dragon Crew capsule
SpaceX has also taken two groups of astronauts to the |International Space Station, with crew from NASA, ESA and JAXA, the Japanese space agency.
SpaceX has been sending batches of 60 satellites into space to help form its Starlink network, which is already in beta and providing fast internet to rural areas.
Branson and Virgin Galactic are taking a different approach to conquering space. It has repeatedly, and successfully, conducted test flights of the Virgin Galactic’s Unity space plane.
The first took place in December 2018 and the latest on May 22, with the flight accelerating to more than 2,000 miles per hour (Mach 2.7).
More than 600 affluent customers to date, including celebrities Brad Pitt and Katy Perry, have reserved a $250,000 (£200,000) seat on one of Virgin’s space trips. The final tickets are expected to cost $350,000.
Branson has previously said he expects Elon Musk to win the race to Mars with his private rocket firm SpaceX.
Richard Branson with the Virgin Galactic craft
SpaceShipTwo can carry six passengers and two pilots. Each passenger gets the same seating position with two large windows – one to the side and one overhead.
The space ship is 60ft long with a 90inch diameter cabin allowing maximum room for the astronauts to float in zero gravity.
It climbs to 50,000ft before the rocket engine ignites. SpaceShipTwo separates from its carrier craft, White Knight II, once it has passed the 50-mile mark.
Passengers become ‘astronauts’ when they reach the Karman line, the boundary of Earth’s atmosphere.
The spaceship will then make a suborbital journey with approximately six minutes of weightlessness, with the entire flight lasting approximately 1.5 hours.
Bezos revealed in April 2017 that he finances Blue Origin with around $1 billion (£720 million) of Amazon stock each year.
The system consists of a pressurised crew capsule atop a reusable ‘New Shepard’ booster rocket.
At its peak, the capsule reached 65 miles (104 kilometres), just above the official threshold for space and landed vertically seven minutes after liftoff.
Blue Origin are working on New Glenn, the next generation heavy lift rocket, that will compete with the SpaceX Falcon 9.
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