SpaceX Launches Private Astronaut Crew In Fram2 Polar-Orbiting Mission

Elon Musk’s SpaceX on Tuesday launched a crew of four private astronauts led by a crypto entrepreneur on a mission to orbit Earth from pole to pole, a novel trajectory in which no humans have travelled before.

Maltese investor Chun Wang, a Chinese-born magnate who founded a bitcoin mining company, is the bankroller and commander of the SpaceX mission, named Fram2, a reference to the Norwegian “Fram" ship that pioneered Arctic exploration at the turn of the 20th century.

Wang and three associates launched aboard SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule at 9.47 pm EDT on Monday (0147 GMT on Tuesday) from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, setting off for a free-flying mission for three to five days, during which they will partake in 22 research experiments largely centered on how spaceflight and microgravity affect the human body.