Polaris Program will Undertake a Series of Pioneering SpaceX Dragon Missions, Demonstrating New Technologies and Culminating in the First Human Spaceflight on Starship
LOS ANGELES, CA, February 14, 2022 (Jared Isaacman PR) – Today Jared Isaacman, founder and CEO of Shift4 (NYSE: FOUR), announced the Polaris Program, a first-of-its-kind effort to rapidly advance human spaceflight capabilities, while continuing to raise funds and awareness for important causes here on Earth. The program will consist of up to three human spaceflight missions that will demonstrate new technologies, conduct extensive research, and ultimately culminate in the first flight of SpaceX’s Starship with humans on board.
The first mission, Polaris Dawn, is targeted for no earlier than the fourth quarter of this year and will be commanded by Isaacman, an accomplished pilot and astronaut who led Inspiration4,the world’s first all-civilian mission to orbit that helped raise over $240 million for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital®.
“The Polaris Program is an important step in advancing human space exploration while helping to solve problems through the use of innovative technology here on Earth,” said Isaacman. “On Polaris Dawn, we endeavor to achieve the highest Earth orbit ever flown in addition to conducting the world’s first commercial spacewalk and testing of Starlink laser-based communication. Alongside these important objectives, we will be supporting scientific research toadvance both human health interests on Earth and our understanding of human health during future long-duration spaceflights.” Building upon the Inspiration4 mission, Polaris Dawn will continue to raise funds and awareness for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital®.
The Polaris Dawn Mission
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket will launch the Polaris Dawn mission from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Dragon and the Polaris Dawn crew will spend up to five days in orbit, flying higher than any Dragon mission to date and endeavoring to reach the highest Earth orbit ever flown.
While in orbit, SpaceX mission control will carefully monitor Dragon and the crew as they:
- Attempt the first-ever commercial spacewalk with SpaceX-designed extravehicular activity (EVA) spacesuits, upgraded from the current intravehicular (IVA) suit. The development of this suit and the execution of the EVA will be important steps toward a scalable design for spacesuits on future long-duration missions.
- Become the first crew to test Starlink laser-based communications in space, providing valuable data for future space communications systems necessary for human spaceflight to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.
- Conduct scientific research designed to advance both human health on Earth and our understanding of human health during future long-duration spaceflights. This includes, but is not limited to:
- Using ultrasound to monitor, detect, and quantify venous gas emboli (VGE), contributing to studies on human prevalence to decompression sickness;
- Gathering data on the radiation environment to better understand how space radiation affects human biological systems;
- Providing biological samples towards multi-omics analyses for a long-term Biobank; and
- Research related to Spaceflight Associated Neuro-Ocular Syndrome (SANS), which is a key risk to human health in long-duration spaceflight.
SpaceX and Polaris Dawn will also collaborate with the Translational Research Institute for Space Health (TRISH), BioServe Space Technologies at the University of Colorado Boulder, Space Technologies Lab at Embry Riddle Aeronautical University, Weill Cornell Medicine, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, and the U.S. Air Force Academy.
The Polaris Dawn Crew
The Polaris Dawn mission has many first-time objectives, so the Polaris Program chose a crew of experts who know each other well and have a foundation of trust they can build upon as they undertake the challenges of this mission. The crew includes:
- Mission Commander, Jared “Rook” Isaacman. In addition to commanding Inspiration4, Isaacman has over 7,000 flight hours of aviation experience, including ratings in multiple experimental and ex-military aircraft. He set speed-around-the-world records in 2008 and 2009, as well as 100 air show performances as a member of the Black Diamond Jet Team, all of which were dedicated to charitable causes. In 2011, Isaacman co-founded what would become the world’s largest private air force, Draken International, to provide realistic adversary training for the United States Department of Defense.
- Mission Pilot, Scott “Kidd” Poteet. Poteet is a retired U.S. Air Force Lieutenant Colonel who served 20 years in various roles to include Commander of the 64th Aggressor Squadron, USAF Thunderbird Demonstration Pilot, #4 Slot, USAF Weapons School Graduate, Operational Test and Evaluation Pilot, and F-16 Flight Examiner. Kidd is a command pilot with over 3,200 flying hours in the F-16, A-4, T-38, T-37, T-3 and Alpha Jet. He logged over 400 hours of combat time in support of various Operations around the world. Following his Air Force career, Kidd served as the Director of Business Development at Draken International as well as the Vice President of Strategy at Shift4 Payments. He most recently served as the Mission Director of Inspiration4.
- Mission Specialist, Sarah Gillis. Gillis is a Lead Space Operations Engineer at SpaceX, responsible for overseeing the company’s astronaut training program. This includes the development of mission-specific curriculum and training execution for both NASA and commercial astronauts who fly aboard the Dragon spacecraft. She prepared NASA astronauts for the first Demo-2 and Crew-1 missions, and most recently directly trained the Inspiration4 astronauts, the first all-civilian crew to go to orbit. Sarah is an experienced mission control operator, who has supported real-time operations for Dragon’s cargo resupply missions to and from the International Space Station as a Navigation Officer, and as a crew communicator for Dragon’s human spaceflight missions.
- Mission Specialist & Medical Officer, Anna Menon. Menon is a Lead Space Operations Engineer at SpaceX, where she manages the development of crew operations and serves in mission control as both a Mission Director and crew communicator. During her tenure at SpaceX, Menon has led the implementation of Dragon’s crew capabilities, helped create the crew communicator operator role, and developed critical operational responses to vehicle emergencies, such as a fire or cabin depressurization. Anna served in mission control during multiple cargo and crew Dragon missions, including Demo-2, Crew-1, CRS-22, and CRS-23. Prior to SpaceX, she worked for seven years at NASA as a biomedical flight controller for the International Space Station.
To learn more about the Polaris Program, visit www.PolarisProgram.com and follow along on Twitter (@PolarisProgram) and Instagram (@PolarisProgram).
72 responses to “Polaris Program will Undertake a Series of Pioneering SpaceX Dragon Missions, Demonstrating New Technologies and Culminating in the First Human Spaceflight on Starship”
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Great to see the ambition of this programme, particularly the development of an EVA version of the SpaceX spacesuit. Something tells me that SpaceX may just be able to provide a lunar version of their suit, if it looks like the NASA development of their lunar suit isn’t going to be ready in time for Artemis
It’s really surprising news, and would go a long way towards alleviating a potential bottleneck for Artemis. I am curious how an EVA in a Crew Dragon will work. Will they add an airlock to the spacecraft, similar to how they added the ‘bubble’ window for the Inspiration4 mission? Or do they just decompress the cabin and have everyone don beefed up IVA suits?
Decompressing the cabin is what I have read.
Decompress the cabin. According to Isaacman, the whole crew will wear the EVA suits and two will do spacewalks.
This is wonderful news! I hope they do get that first Polaris Dawn mission into space before the end of 2022! What a year!
I first saw Eric Berger tweet about this, then I skimmed the Polaris website, read the Washington Post article, and now I’m here.
I’m bemused by the fact that in the comments section of the WP article, this great news is already drawing the crab-bucket socialists out of the woodwork, to whine about capitalism and fantasize about killing all the billionaires and stealing all their money.
$L$ delenda est
It’s funny how much of the arts and science culture is still based on the attitudes of the ancient Greeks who looked down on business because in their society business was assigned to slaves. Instead of seeing the great Business Revolution that started in Medieval Europe as lifting humanity out of thousands of years of poverty and starvation they view those business owners as they would view “slaves” who are trying to get above their station in society.
Yeah. Those endless idiotic comments are as disgusting as they are clueless.
Crab bucket socialists are pretty much the target demographic for the WaPo so no surprise there.
a pretty solid group of people. So one can assume this is an earth orbiting effort (interaction with starlink) …and an EVA
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good luck. I will be curious to see what comes of this. what direction they are heading. its unclear that this has any economic feedback safe flights
Yes, their goal is to achieve the highest crew Earth orbit, breaking the record NASA set during Project Gemini when Gemini 11 reached a height of 1,375 km.
in my view one of the least meaningful goals. the notion of the new space EVA suit is exciting to me. As is essentially qualifying Dragon for EVA ops. This is one of the first real tries at an EVA suit with modern materials and technology…and that information and knowledge is something that could in theory have a lot of value. I am curious if Axiom is driving this…as I know that they are collaborating heavily with SpaceX in terms of the new modules on the space station
Meaningful is a matter of perceptive. The publicity of doing something no other nation has been able to do since the 1960’s is going to get noticed. I wonder if the Great and Powerful FAA AST will claim they are not astronauts.
ah the great space fan hope “the publicity” OK say it gets a lot of publicity. what does that do? Nothing
but it wont. if there is an EVA it will get the cable markets (assuming there is live video) but thats it. its not like Americans will say “wow this changes everything”
if they are doing it for PR its a bust. ok one of them dies. that gets you PR
It really depends on the public mood at the time.
I am not sure how the public would get excited over this (other than a gigantic tragedy …that gest them every time) RGO
I think you’re looking for “What are they trying to do?” like this is part of an undisclosed grand business vision. And, you may be right.
My impression though is that it’s not a “they” but a “him”, him being Isaacman, and I think he’s trying to do pretty much what he says – do something(s) to advance human spaceflight while raising money for his favorite charity, St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital. The unspoken part is that he very much wants to do these things himself, not pay to have someone else do them. He wants to have adventures.
Why go for the highest orbital flight ever? To get in the aerospace record books. His hobby is flying airplanes, doing aerobatics, flying military trainer jets… what’s next? There is no next for a non-military test pilot or NASA astronaut; no more frontiers, no more important records to be broken. But now, suddenly, there is.
To your greater point of what is the economic utility of humans in space, I agree that it’s a real and significant issue. Until not only launch but life support/housing costs come way down, the expense of having humans in space is going to be hard to justify. And meanwhile robotics and AI continue to advance
agreed and well said. One has to hope that it is just more than what in aviation is called “the P51 lore” …and to the extent that it advances the state of the art at SpaceX and technology in general maybe it will be. I worry about human spaceflight simply degenirating into the rich and the famous and a few government employees
Ouch!
LOL fly safe
The FAA has already stated it will no longer make any pronouncements about who is or isn’t an astronaut.
Snarky! I like it.
Yeah, “Highest Earth Orbital flight” seems relatively meaningless since people have already been to the Moon and all. Meanwhile, the extra radiation dose can’t be great for Isaacman who plans to do more space flights; however, the flight will only be a few days, so maybe no big deal.
Hopefully they can test out some kind of radiation shelter, like maybe a water-lined compartment or some such — that could be useful
with a history of commercial high altitude flight. I track that stuff. a radiation shelter would be a clever idea to test.
Axiom will certainly be a potential beneficiary of the EVA suit work now underway. But Axiom isn’t driving this, Isaacman is.
yes this is certainly his “I love me moment”. actually I stand corrected on this. Axiom is building its own suit. I know that for a fact
I hadn’t heard that Axiom would do suits too, but the more the merrier.
yeah they are actually working on EVA suits…serious suits
Serious suits? Three-piece suits with vests and ties? 🙂
There’s no current mention of EVA suits anywhere on the Axiom website, but I’ll look in occasionally and see if anything shows up.
and hat 🙂
I dont think the project is in anything but early develoopment
Funny! I love him too.
we all love him 🙂
I imagine it will have some economic feedback for the SpaceX employees.
and maybe thats the limit of it. But I suspect there is more…SpaceX is trying to acquire some specific technology applications here…in a field where there has been little or no advancement in 40 years. ie EVA suits. that to me is very significant because at least on the outside there is no real economic advantage of it…but someone has some data which thinks it is
second SpaceX is trying to redefine the notion of who gets picked to fly in space. ALL these people are quite talented on their own etc. but this would change the astronaut slection criteria quite a lot…
it is to me impressive. someone has a plan for some money somewhere
Or they just want to do something that risk adverse NASA would never do.
maybe but I am not sure I see anything risky here. there are a few ways you could go at the EVA. Plan 1 would be to simply recreate the Gemini suit ie something that doesnt have much more ability than what the “orange suits” had or the current SpaceX/Boeing Suits have for short and very limited duration EVA’s.
most of the fan boys are already drawing EVA suits that are basically that. really not a big deal here
the second would be some risk, to develop a real advance in pressure suits for EVA’s but there is a reasonable amount of work and testing there.
all this would have to pit through the top hatch…I’ve worn and worked in the current Shuttle EVA suit and the “orange suits” modified for tethered EVA capability with very modest (Gemini scale) on suit life support. neither are something you want to wear long term (meaning more than an hour or two)
we need a real suit advancement. but whatever they come up with (and qualifying the Dragon for serious vacumn operation would be impressive and let them own some technology
I believe that you’re thinking too big here. Specifically, iirc, it was mentioned by Isaacman that the suit would be a development of the present SpaceX launch/landing suit. Think “iterative development”.
Of course, I could be completely wrong, and heck, I hope I am. Anyway, it’s early days, so let’s stay tuned and see what more is said about this suit initiative in the months ahead
thats the most logical and cheap thing to do. the Gemini EVA was essentially the launch pressure suit. There have been sims with the “orange suits” and the Boeing Blue suits as EVA (I know this for a fact I have worn them both)
BUT thats nothing more then a personalized space craft and no where near a suit that is a practical EVA suit. at most you are good for Gemini IV like EVA’s …a few minutes at best…and while thats “OK” in terms of gaining some data points it doesnt move the ball down the field…at all. that data is well understood. I”ve talked to folks who have flown in the SpaceX suit and all of them would have taken a Gemini or Blue suit over it (6 people)
I suspect robotics might be catching up with this. the one person craft are pretty impressive. a coworker got to “suit out” in one the other day. had high marks for it
That’s really cool that you got to wear those suits.
What was your experience with the gloves — pretty bad, or not as bad as some say? I’ve read about astronauts with planned EVAs constantly doing forearm and hand excercises and then coming back from spacewalks with bruised fingernails, etc.
Meanwhile, yeah, I agree that humans are on the clock regarding robotics developments overtaking us
The SpaceX/Polaris EVA suits will be a long way from lunar surface EVA-capable, but will still be at least as much a step forward as the Gemini suits were anent the Mercury suits. Isaacman, in an interview with Tim Dodd, The Everyday Astronaut, hinted that there will be some sort of limited life support system included in the suits as a backup to the umbilicals even if nothing so major as the “backpacks” of ISS and Apollo EVA suits. On the Polaris missions, every crew member will be wearing the EVA suits.
But I suspect Mr. Isaacman’s ambitions for further adventures in space will not terminate with the last currently-planned Polaris mission. He will likely be influencing the SpaceX suitworks to continue on toward fully-lunar-capable EVA suits as I think he has ambitions of leaving some bootprints of his own in the lunar regolith.
Or would do only on a much more lengthy timescale.
Isaacman appears to share Elon’s passion for pushing the boundaries of space travel. They’re both smart, aggressive, and have really deep pockets. They could make a pretty dynamic duo, if their egos don’t get in the way.
the question is where are they going wtih this…is there any money at the bottom of the pot…if not its no better than NASA
I share your curiosity on what silver bullet will make human space travel a profitable business. I’m starting to suspect that pay-per-view space sports might play a big part in that. The geeks will hate it…but the jocks will love it.
maybe, but I am doubtful. I think that there are somethings like maybe a national project in space (solar power) which IF Starship is a success at the price level they are claiming makes it possible or some process. but it will start slow. I am doubtful that there will be more than 25 people or so in orbit at the end of the decade
I’m not that pessimistic. But I agree that this will take time. The years just keep ticking away, don’t they.
I am worried that the window to do this might be closing. Robotics are increasing at a rapid rate…and human activities are not. at some point people can just figure out how to do what needs to be done robotically. I really dont care “about me” seeing it. But I would like my kids to have those oppurtunities
Exactly. And if solar power turns out to be the magic bullet, bring it on. But I have read that it is more likely to be useful on surfaces without atmospheres.
Yes, a SSPS at the Earth-Moon L1 would allow allow 24 hour power for a lunar facility.
When that becomes possible…almost everything else we can think up to do on the Moon becomes possible. Yay!
Only for facilities on the Earth-facing side of the Moon. I think much closer orbits would be better and allow electrification of the Farside as well.
I would only look for that if, and I dont expect this to happen, that Starship gets down to airline operating cost this decade. my expectations are quite a lot lower. I suspect Musk gets to the 50t stage at about 100-150 million cost sometime by the end of the decade…and only with rather massive design changes along the way so thats probably a non starter…I really dont expect a lot of breakthroughs on ISS until the AXIOM addition comes up and starts operating.
Still hoping the government is going to something beyond NASA? I gave up on that decades ago. NASA has no interest in space settlement or anytype of economic development.
NASA is a cold war relic…its like much of American government today…we were moving to something different during the Clinton years…but Bush and his prelude to MAGA restarted the cold war mentality and here we are. humans in spaceflight is going to go one of two ways. either it is going to become the playground of the rich where essentially nothing that benefits mankind is going to be done…or there is going to be some product, some thing there which moves national policy to embrace it into the “shadow” of the nation and then like the west and aviation and computers and …it will blossom. Without something embedded in a nations economic system no nation will get interested init, and no individual even St. Elon can afford it…because it makes no money
the problem is that there is not going to be anything economic wise that will support the million person city or whatever on Mars that interjects into the economy of any country.
however there probably is some product, some method, some something that pulls the starter cord of theengine. we just have not gotten there yet.
the most important policy decision this administration has made so far, is allowing Axiom to go to the station and eventually take over running it from NASA. thats a big deal and probably the start of its real activity as an industrial hub
I dunno. I give Putin more credit than Bush for kickstarting the Cold War again. And since it was Obama who slapped all those sanctions on Russia, and banned Rogozin from entering the U.S, I suspect that he would agree with me.
But I agree with you completely about Axiom…”that’s a big deal”.
it moves the space station into a real era of discovery…and aligns the European and US economic development system (and Japanese) . we need to get the Space station to 12 westerners (including japanese)
The ISS isn’t just a NASA station, it owned by the 16 different partners who have to agree on who runs it. Also NASA has already announced it will splash into the Pacific when it’s done with it. So there is nothing for Axiom to take over.
Nor is Axiom interested in doing so. It will hive off and operate its module complex as an independent station.
In it’s defense…NASA can’t afford space settlement, and doesn’t know squat about economic development. It’s having a helluva hard time just building a rocket with Grandpa’s old parts and plans.
…I am doubtful that there will be more than 25 people or so in orbit at the end of the decade…
So I’m guessing that this prediction is based on your theory that Starship won’t be carrying people until sometime next decade. That sure would disappoint NASA with their HLS aspirations. And I imagine that SX will be doing a number of crewed Earth orbits before they tackle Moon landings.
25 people at any one time in orbit with say plus or minus 10 more. 🙂 I will be very surprised if Musk has the time or the money to start working on carrying people on Starship before 26/27. And yes under normal circumstances that would dissapoint NASA but its OK SLS/ORion wont be ready to carry people in any sort of attempt at a lunar landing until near the end of the decade. I think SLS gets one off this year, but its well into 24 before they try the crewed one and that assumes all goes well
I dont see SpaceX trying a Starship launch anything soon. Maybe late August or maybe just sometime this year. Then what happens next depends on how that goes, but my guess is that there is a year or so of trying to sort out what caused the 4/20 to be less get the new engines going and well try and come up with something useful. We will see where that goes.
Nothing would surprise me abotu Starship. but what I expect is a stop/start development process that trys to make all the unique parts of it work.
but even if the lunar landing (Gasp) works. nothing points to more than small numbers of people in space. there is no economic reason for them
I have a scenario that might get us over 25 people to orbit before 2030. Using your guestimate of 26/27 to start carrying people to orbit on Starship, Elon has estimated that SX’s cost would be about 10 million dollars per flight. So they charge $25 million, book 50 people, and that’s $500,000 per person. That’s just a bit more than Branson hopes to charge for suborbital. I’m guessing that most customers will be government agencies from around the world, various deep pocket foundations, and the usual filthy-rich riff-raff.
ok at that price point then there might be something to it. the problem is that price point is fantasy. there is no way it happens by anything this decade. Elon could simply charge that and take the rest out of his pocket. But he wont. He is not very charitable when it comes to lift. This would be like going from the lift cost of a DC 3 to those of a B707 in one generation. or a 8088 to a Pentium. its simply not possible in technology.
I look have looked at the issue of “how do humans get into space in large numbers” a bunch of different ways. But I really see no way that this even starts without some “application” that in some form or fashion requires 1) massive up down lift and 2) some human involvement. and then you might start the ball rolling but it will take another 20 years for it to roll to any serious level of price point
this is my main “angst” with Musk. he says things which are reasonable aspirational as if they were possible. HE MIGHT someday get the STarship design or some version of it down to 10 million a launch…but it wont be this version or the next or the one after that. the one after that “might” get him below 100 million…with 50Tons. and that would be a technological miracle
but even then it wont sustain space ops for humans UNLESS there is something there which makes money for money invested.
there is no history other wise of htis happening on anything other than an individual scale
Yep, it is one of markets that look good when you do marketing analysis.
Quite so. There is already some serious money chasing that potential market.
There is already one free-flying LEO space station project with zero-G sports – mostly combat sports – as its motivation. There is a second such project being designed as an attachment to the Axiom space station complex that will start out attached to the ISS.
Isaacman, at least, is pushing to expand the envelope of adventure space tourism. Others will certainly want to follow his lead. A decade or two hence, the number of people annually doing spacewalks from Starships and/or walking on the lunar surface could rival the number who now look to summit Everest.
That doesn’t seem to have been any problem thus far. I suspect that will remain the case. Isaacman is an adventurer who also likes to mix in some public service with his adventures. He seeks means to have more adventures. Musk is not an adventurer. He is an enabler of adventurers. It’s a good match.
True. But back in the day…
From Business Insider:
Elon Musk used to fly high-performance jets in the early days of the SpaceX and Tesla.
Back in the PayPal days Musk used to own a McLaren F1 too. Hell, when I was that age I used to ride motorcycles. Isaacman is 39 and still adventuring. I had put away my boots and helmet well before I turned 39.
The ordering of these missions already represents an appreciable amount of money for SpaceX. But there will certainly be knock-on effects too. Getting Starship to a crew-capable state of development ASAP means things like P2P service, orbital tourism and lunar settlement can begin perhaps a bit sooner than otherwise might have been the case.
Who, and what kind of people, get picked to fly in space was going to change in any event. That used to be a government monopoly decision. But Space Adventures, VG, Blue Origin and SpaceX have now broken that monopoly. Government-appointed astronauts will be a smaller and smaller fraction of the total who travel in space going forward. Selection criteria will be increasingly determined by commercial requirements and/or ability to pay.
Well, it represents another decent chunk of commercial business for both Crew Dragon 2 and Starship. It also doubles the number of non-Musk billionaires pushing for Starship to be crew-capable ASAP.
doubles yes. 🙂