The First Space Travel Exclusively for Civilians... Three Days Orbiting Earth at 575km Altitude

SpaceX 'Inspiration4' Crew Spacecraft Launch Success
First Civilian-Only Spaceflight Without Professional Astronauts
Rated More Advanced and Professional Than Previous Cases

[Image source=Reuters Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy New York=Correspondent Baek Jong-min] At 8:02 PM local time on the 15th, SpaceX's Falcon rocket carrying the four civilian astronauts of the Inspiration4 team soared into the sky from Kennedy Space Center's Pad 39 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, USA.

As if to celebrate the first-ever space trip consisting solely of civilians, the capricious Florida weather did not cause any trouble, and the rocket left Earth exactly on schedule.

The rocket ascended toward space, leaving bright flames against the black sky. While the rocket was rising, the astronauts appeared relaxed, waving at the cameras. After 2 minutes and 46 seconds from launch, the first stage of the rocket separated. The separated first stage safely landed on an unmanned barge waiting in the Atlantic Ocean 9 minutes and 40 seconds after the initial launch.

Ten minutes after launch, the second stage stopped firing flames. Around 12 minutes and 20 seconds after launch, the Crew Dragon carrying the astronauts began flying alone. The Crew Dragon, separated from the rocket, soon reached an altitude of 575 km above the ground and started a three-day orbit around Earth. This moment marked the beginning of the era of space travel exclusively for civilians, enabled by a reusable private space rocket and capsule.

With this, Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, who has been accelerating space development through SpaceX following the electric vehicle revolution, took a significant step forward in his dream. Musk showed great anticipation by changing his Twitter profile picture to a photo of the Inspiration4 members.

Previously, Richard Branson, chairman of Virgin Group, set the record for the first private space trip, and Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, also experienced space aboard the Blue Origin spacecraft he established. However, the challenge by SpaceX and the Inspiration4 members is considered to be on a different level. The spacecrafts boarded by Bezos and Branson only reached altitudes of 100 km and 86 km, respectively. The time spent experiencing space was less than 10 minutes, leading to debates about whether it truly qualified as space travel.

The SpaceX Inspiration4 team emphasized that this was the highest altitude humans have reached since the Hubble Space Telescope project. Although they lagged behind in the first private space travel competition, they implied that they are the true winners. SpaceX is showing strong confidence, cooperating with Netflix to air a documentary about Inspiration4.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.