SpaceX to Conduct First Crewed Mission in Polar Orbit Funded by Bitcoin Mining Tycoon
Elon Musk’s SpaceX to Send Four-Person Crew on Unprecedented Polar Orbit Mission
A crew of four is preparing for an unusual journey into space, one that no human has attempted before: flying directly over the Earth’s North and South Poles. The mission, called Fram2 and carried out by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, is being funded by Chun Wang, the founder of the Bitcoin mining pool F2Pool, who is based in Malta and made his fortune through Bitcoin mining.
The crew, set to launch aboard a SpaceX capsule, includes three adventurers who were chosen by Wang based on their polar expedition experiences. These individuals are Jannicke Mikkelsen, a Norwegian filmmaker, Rabea Rogge, a German robotics researcher, and Eric Philips, an Australian explorer. None of them have been to space before.
The mission is scheduled to lift off from Florida at 9:46 p.m. ET on Monday. It will take the crew on a path that no human spaceflight has ever traveled. While some satellites use polar orbits for Earth observation, human missions have typically followed paths closer to the equator. Fram2, however, will fly directly over both poles with a true 90-degree inclination.
F2Pool, at one point, became one of the largest mining pools in the Bitcoin network, contributing a significant portion of the network’s hash rate. However, as the Bitcoin mining space became more competitive, F2Pool’s role has diminished. Currently, it accounts for just over 10% of Bitcoin’s total hash rate.
The cost of Chun’s investment in the multi-day flight is unknown. In a 2022 interview, Chun revealed that he personally mined over 7,700 Bitcoin during the first two years of F2Pool’s existence. At the time of the interview, this amount was valued at around $640 million.
The space mission presents various opportunities for research. The crew will participate in studies on the effects of space travel on the human body, including brain fluid shifts and sleep disruptions. They will also undergo MRI scans similar to those conducted on SpaceX’s 2024 Polaris Dawn mission.
The mission will also include an experiment by British startup Hormona, which aims to track hormone fluctuations in female astronauts. Mikkelsen and Rogge will use urine test strips during the flight. The data collected could potentially help close the gender data gap in medicine, as only about 15% of the more than 700 people who have traveled to space have been women.
In addition to medical studies, Fram2 will conduct a range of experiments, such as growing mushrooms in space, testing exercise routines in microgravity, and observing polar auroras from orbit. The crew is expected to spend three to five days in orbit before returning to Earth with a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean.
