Inspiration4

Inspiration4 (stylized as Inspirati④n) was a 2021 human spaceflight operated by SpaceX on behalf of Shift4 Payments CEO Jared Isaacman. The mission launched the Crew Dragon Resilience on September 16, 2021, at 00:02:56 UTC from Kennedy Space Center's Launch Complex 39A atop a Falcon 9 launch vehicle. It placed the Dragon capsule into a low Earth orbit. The mission ended on September 18, 2021, at 23:06:49 UTC, when Resilience splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean. The trip was the first orbital spaceflight with only private citizens aboard and was part of a charitable effort on behalf of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee. Isaacman was named mission commander. The hospital selected two commercial astronauts: cancer survivor Hayley Arceneaux and military veteran Christopher Sembroski. Shift4 selected entrepreneur Sian Proctor, who was named pilot. The mission overlapped with the 55th anniversary of Gemini 11, which in September 1966 had an apogee of approximately 1,368 km (850 mi), the highest Earth orbit ever reached on a crewed flight until Polaris Dawn in 2024, which was also operated by SpaceX on behalf of Isaacman. The Inspiration4 flight reached an orbital altitude of approximately 585 km (364 mi), the highest achieved since STS-103 in 1999 and the fifth-highest Earth orbital human spaceflight overall. By comparison, the International Space Station is at 408 km (254 mi). The Inspiration4 mission concluded with the first crewed splashdown in the Atlantic Ocean since Apollo 9 in 1969.