SpaceX Set to Launch 4 Civilians on First-of-Its-Kind Mission Around Earth’s Poles
SpaceX Set to Launch 4 Civilians on First-of-Its-Kind Mission Around Earth’s Poles
A crew of four civilian astronauts led by cryptocurrency billionaire Chun Wang is set to launch on a SpaceX capsule that will fly them over Earth’s poles. They will be the first humans to take on this mission.
The crew is scheduled to launch from a launchpad in Florida’s Cape Canaveral during a 4.5-hour window that opens at 9:46 p.m. Eastern Time. The private mission will focus heavily on gathering health data from space travelers and advancing private space exploration to the next level.
Billionaire Chun Wang is financing the mission, which was named Fram2. This was the name of a Norwegian ship that explorers used for key expeditions to the North and South poles of the planet at the turn of the 20th century.
SpaceX was paid an undisclosed amount of money for the civilian mission to Earth’s Poles
Wang, a Malta-based investor, made his fortune through bitcoin mining operations. His crew consists of three polar explorers who have previously accompanied him in his travels. Norwegian film director, Jannicke Mikkelsen, German robotics researcher, Rabea Rogge, and Eric Philips will all be aboard the spacecraft.
None of the crew members had previously been to space. During an interview on the SpaceX CEO Elon Musk-owned social media platform X (formerly known as Twitter), Chun said, “My own journey has been shaped by lifelong curiosity and the fascination with pushing boundaries.”
This is huge.
Tonight SpaceX will launch the first ever crewed orbit around the Earth’s poles.
Aboard Dragon, Fram2 will:
– Document the Arctic and Antarctic
– Conduct the first human X-ray in space
– Perform 22 spaceflight research studiesHistoric and scientific precedence. https://t.co/FpKYHkVWZ5 pic.twitter.com/uZ4WqvFBk9
— A. Pettit (@PettitFrontier) March 31, 2025
Fram2 follows SpaceX’s space tourism trips that began in 2021 with the Inspiration4 mission. The group aims to pay homage to their fascination with exploring our planet’s poles. The flight path that the four men will follow during this unprecedented mission requires more fuel than flights that chase orbits close to the equator.
Earth’s poles cannot be seen from the International Space Station
The crew at the International Space Station cannot see Earth’s poles because the station orbits near Earth’s equatorial line. The closest a space mission ever came to flying over our planet’s poles was Vostok 6, a Soviet spaceflight in 1963.
Crucially, however, this mission was flown at an inclination of 65 degrees. In contrast, Fram2 will be launched at an inclination of 90 degrees, which means the spacecraft will fly perpendicularly to the equator.
Targeting Monday, March 31 for Falcon 9 to launch Dragon and the @Framonauts’ Fram2 mission to orbit → https://t.co/vSt6tfeLZG pic.twitter.com/UwwEIobmOg
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) March 29, 2025
The bodies of the mission’s crew members will also be studied. Scientists are expected to examine how their bodies react to weightlessness and motion sickness, which are common symptoms experienced by astronauts. Fram2 and its crew will spend three to five days in space before returning to Earth near the coast of California.