SpaceX’s Polaris Dawn completed the first private spacewalk

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SpaceX's Polaris Dawn astronauts have successfully conducted a spacewalk, the first conducted by a private company. After depressurizing SpaceX's Dragon capsule, the billionaire who is funding the mission, Jared Isaacman, exited the spacecraft early Thursday morning.

With his torso and head fully extended outside the capsule, Isaacman conducted tests on SpaceX's new spacesuits, which are designed for greater mobility. “We all have a lot of work to do back home,” Isaacman said during the spacewalk. “But from here, it really looks like a perfect world.”

After Isaacman returned to the capsule, SpaceX engineer Sarah Gillis left the spacecraft to conduct further tests. Neither was floating freely, and both relied on 12-foot (3.6-meter) umbilicals to supply them with oxygen.

The other two privately trained Polaris Dawn astronauts, SpaceX engineer Anna Menon and retired U.S. Air Force fighter pilot Scott Poteet, remained in the capsule. They were left exposed to the vacuum of space because the Dragon capsule does not have an airlock.

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