3-day space tourists back on planet Earth
Four space tourists safely ended their
trailblazing trip to orbit Saturday with a splashdown in the Atlantic off the Florida coast. The successful launch and return of the mission, the latest in a recent string of rocket-powered expeditions bankrolled by their billionaire passengers, marked another milestone in the fledgling industry of commercial astro-tourism, 60 years after the dawn of human spaceflight. The four space novices spent three days orbiting Earth, travelling farther than the International Space Station and circling the globe more than 15 times each day.
CAPE CANAVERAL, FLORIDA: Four space tourists safely ended their trailblazing trip to orbit on Saturday with a splashdown in the Atlantic off the Florida coast.
Their SpaceX capsule parachuted into the ocean just before sunset, not far from where their chartered flight began three days earlier. The amateur crew was the first to circle the world without a professional astronaut.
The billionaire who paid undisclosed millions for the trip and his three guests wanted to show that ordinary people could blast into orbit by themselves, and SpaceX founder Elon Musk took them on as the company’s first rocket-riding tourists. “Your mission has shown the world that space is for all of us,” SpaceX mission control radioed.
“It was a heck of a ride for us,” replied trip sponsor Jared Isaacman.
SpaceX’s fully automated Dragon capsule reached an altitude of 585km after Wednesday night’s lift-off. Surpassing the International Space Station by 160km, the passengers savoured views of Earth through a big bubble-shaped window on the top of the capsule.
The four streaked back through the atmosphere early on Saturday evening, the first space travellers to end their flight in the Atlantic since Apollo 9 in 1969. SpaceX’s two previous crew splashdowns - carrying astronauts for the Nasa - were in the Gulf of Mexico.
Within a few minutes, a pair of SpaceX boats pulled up alongside the bobbing capsule. When the capsule’s hatch was opened on the recovery ship, healthcare worker Hayley Arceneaux was the first one out, flashing a big smile and thumbs up.
Their families were waiting near the scene of Wednesday night’s launch from Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center. This time, the Nasa was little more than an encouraging bystander, its only link being the Kennedy launch pad once used for the Apollo moonshots and shuttle crews, but now leased by SpaceX.