“Seeing the dry flight from the interior of the spacecraft changed the perspective a lot”, said SpaceX flight engineer Sarah Gillis, the day before the launch of the Polaris Dawn mission. This happened after completing an extensive simulation.
This historic project will usher in a new era in space exploration and will include the longest manned flight from Earth since the Apollo 17 mission in 1972. During the mission, a commercial spacewalk will be carried out for the first time.
If time permits, the Polaris Dawn mission is scheduled to launch at 3:38 a.m., Eastern time, on August 28 from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
Together with mission specialist Sarah Gillis, pilot Scott Poteat, medical officer and mission specialist Anna Menon, and mission commander Jared Isaacman will make up the crew for the five-day excursion. The Crew Dragon capsule will carry the crew on a Falcon 9 rocket.
A series of intense training exercises and simulations have already been completed by the Polaris Dawn team in preparation for the mission. With Crew Dragon crew members undergoing specialized training, Gillis stressed the importance of these exercises before launch.
