SpaceX Delays Launch Of Private Human Spaceflight Mission Polaris Dawn: Program Founder Jared Isaacman Says 'Will Happily Take An Extra Day To Ensure Readiness'

Elon Musk‘s rocket manufacturing company SpaceX will launch the Polaris Dawn mission on Aug.27, the company said on X on Wednesday, a day later than originally planned.

What Happened: The mission was initially expected to launch on Aug. 26. However, SpaceX is now looking to launch Polaris Dawn on Aug. 27 from Florida aboard the company’s Falcon 9 rocket.

The new date, SpaceX said, will allow additional time for teams to complete preflight checkouts ahead of the launch.

“We will happily take an extra day to ensure readiness,” mission commander and Shift4 Payments CEO Jared Isaacman wrote on X.

Why It Matters: The Polaris program is a private human spaceflight program founded by Isaacman. It will consist of up to three human spaceflight missions, the first of which is Polaris Dawn.

SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft and the all-civilian Polaris Crew composed of four including its mission commander Isaacman, Kidd Poteet, Sarah Gillis, and Anna Menon will spend up to five days in orbit. While Isaacman and Poteet work together at Shift4, Gillis and Menon are both SpaceX engineers.

The key objective of the mission is to conduct a spacewalk nearly 435 miles above the Earth — marking the first-ever spacewalk by a commercial company — with the help of a SpaceX-designed extravehicular activity spacesuit.

While space agency NASA routinely conducts extravehicular activities, no private player has attempted it before, making this a landmark mission for SpaceX and commercial spaceflight companies.

“This will be the first spacewalk by a commercial company and the furthest from Earth anyone has traveled in over half a century!” SpaceX CEO Musk wrote on X on Wednesday.

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Photo courtesy: Polaris Dawn