by SpaceX plans to make space history later this year by launching the first manned mission to explore Earth’s polar regions.
This four-person flight, which SpaceX announced today (August 12), is named Fram2, in honor of the Norwegian ship that pioneered voyages to the Arctic and Antarctic between 1893 and 1912.
“Fram2 will be commanded by Chun Wang, an entrepreneur and adventurer from Malta,” SpaceX wrote in a mission description today. “Wang’s goal for the mission is to highlight the crew’s spirit of discovery, instill a sense of wonder and curiosity in the general public, and demonstrate how technology can help push the boundaries of Earth exploration and the mission’s research.”
On board Fram2, in addition to Wang, are Norwegian Jannicke Mikkelsen as vehicle commander, Australian Eric Philips as vehicle pilot and German Rabea Rogge as mission specialist. According to SpaceX, all four are newcomers to space travel.
If all goes according to plan, Fram2 will launch on a Falcon 9 rocket from Florida’s Space Coast later this year and carry the quartet into orbit in a Crew Dragon capsule. The spacecraft will not attach to the International Space Station (ISS) but will orbit the Earth alone.
“During the three- to five-day mission, the crew plans to observe Earth’s polar regions through Dragon’s dome from an altitude of 425 to 450 km. [249 to 264 miles]“Using insights from space physicists and citizen scientists to study unusual light emissions similar to auroras,” SpaceX wrote in the mission description.
“The crew will study green fragments and mauve bands of continuous emissions comparable to the phenomenon known as STEVE (Strong Thermal Emission Velocity Enhancement), measured at an altitude of about 400 to 500 km. [249 to 311 miles] above the Earth’s atmosphere,” the company added.
The Fram2 crew will also investigate the effects of space travel on the human body. According to SpaceX, this work will also include taking the first X-ray image of a human in space.
Related: How SpaceX’s private Polaris Dawn astronauts will attempt the first purely civilian spacewalk
Fram2 will be SpaceX’s sixth private astronaut mission. Previous missions include Inspiration4, a freeflyer that launched in September 2021; Ax-1, Ax-2 and Ax-3, flights by Houston-based Axiom Space that carried humans to and from the ISS in April 2022, May 2023 and January-February this year; and Polaris Dawn, another freeflyer currently scheduled to launch on August 26.
Polaris Dawn is the first of three planned missions under the private Polaris program. All three are funded and led by billionaire technology entrepreneur Jared Isaacman, who also did the same for Inspiration4.
SpaceX has also launched nine astronaut missions to the ISS for NASA, beginning with the Demo-2 test flight to the orbiting laboratory in 2020.
