The Fram2 mission capsule of the SpaceX company, founded by Elon Musk, completed for the first time an orbital flight over Earth passing the North Pole and the South Pole, SpaceX reports.
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What is the Fram2 mission?
Fram2 is a private space mission funded by crypto billionaire Chun Wang. The voyage lasted four days and became the first manned mission in history to fly over both poles of the planet. Until now, manned spacecraft had only orbited near the equator.
The crew consisted of Chun Wang himself as commander, Norwegian film director Janike Mikkelsen, German robotics researcher Rabea Rögge and Australian polar explorer Eric Philips. They all have ties to polar research and met in Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago just 1300 km from the North Pole.
What did they do during the mission?
During the flight, the team conducted 22 scientific experiments. They grew mushrooms in microgravity, performed the first X-ray in space, tested exercise routines to preserve muscle mass and measured hormone levels with test strips.
They also recorded polar aurora phenomena, including one known as “Steve”-a band of light that resembles the aurora but is only seen at certain latitudes.
According to Chun Wang, all team members suffered from a form of space nausea at the beginning: even taking a sip of water could make them vomit. But by the second day they were feeling much better.
Chun Wang
On their return, they conducted an evacuation drill: each person had to get out of the capsule on their own, remove their harnesses and take out a survival kit weighing 16 kilos. The exercise is intended to evaluate a crew’s ability to act without assistance after a mission.
Where did they land?
The capsule successfully splashed down in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California. It is SpaceX’s first manned splashdown in the Pacific since 2019. Previously, all missions ended near Florida. This time, the west coast was chosen for safety reasons, to prevent parts of the spacecraft from falling on inhabited areas.