Japanese fashion tycoon Yusaku Maezawa he has chosen eight passengers who he says will accompany him on a trip around the moon, propelled by SpaceX’s Starship spacecraft, yet to be flown.
The mission, called “Dear Moon”, was first announced in 2018.
Maezawa initially intended to take a group of artists with him on a six-day trip around the moon, but later announced that he had expanded his definition of “artist”.
Instead, he said he would be open to people from all walks of life as long as they saw themselves as artists, Maezawa said in a video ad last year.
The crew chosen were: the American DJ steve aok i, youtuber Tim Dod, the czech multidisciplinary artist Yemi AD Irish photographer Rhiannon Adam the photographer Karim Iliya the indian actor Dev Joshi the documentarian Brendan Hall and the South Korean rapper Choi Seung Hyun which goes by the stage name TOP
“I can’t miss this opportunity,” Aoki said in a video announcement. “My soul is, is begging for it.”
A reserve team made up of US Olympic snowboarder Kaitlyn Farrington and the Japanese dancer miyu was also selected.
Dear Moon still announces that its mission will lift off in 2023, although SpaceX’s new rocket and spacecraft system, known as Starship, has yet to perform its first orbital test flight.
Maezawa is paying an undisclosed amount for the trip and said he will take his passengers for free.
There were two main criteria for selecting Maezawa’s fellow travelers, the mission’s website noted: Candidates should seek to “push the boundaries” in their field of work, going into space “to help other people and society at large in some way.” ” and they must be willing to support their crewmates during the voyage.
At one point last year, Maezawa also said he would use a dating program to look for a “life partner” who would join him on the journey. But he later canceled those plans, saying he had “mixed feelings” about participating in the venture.
Since the Dear Moon mission was first announced, Maezawa has made his first trip to space, taking a self-funded 12-day trip to the International Space Station. This December 2021 trip made use of a Russian Soyuz spacecraft.
Rocket is a work in progress
SpaceX’s massive Starship rocket is still under development at the company’s South Texas test facility.
Some early prototypes have performed brief “jump tests”, some of which have flown a few kilometers above Earth, but the company has yet to test the Super Heavy, a gigantic 69-meter rocket that will be needed to propel the 50-meter Starship spacecraft to Earth. Earth orbit or beyond.
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has said for months that he will be prepared to conduct the test soon, although the company is still awaiting a launch permit from federal regulators.
Musk had previously said he expected Starship to fly regularly by 2023, but it’s unclear whether SpaceX will meet that deadline.
The aerospace industry is known for projects that take much longer – and incur much higher expenses – than initially anticipated.
If Starship’s first test flights are successful and the Dear Moon mission takes off, Maezawa’s crew could be the first group of citizens to venture beyond low Earth orbit.
The six-day mission is expected to spend three days reaching its destination and take a slingshot trip around the moon before returning to Earth.
Source: CNN Brasil
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