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Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
Business
Samantha Masunaga

SpaceX announces first all-private-astronaut mission into orbit

In a new chapter of commercial spaceflight, SpaceX plans to launch a crew of only private astronauts into orbit — the world’s first such mission.

The Elon Musk-led company announced Monday that it’s set to launch tech entrepreneur Jared Isaacman, chief executive of payments firm Shift4 Payments, and three others as early as the fourth quarter of this year. The mission, named Inspiration4, is intended to increase support for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

The crew would be aboard SpaceX’s Crew Dragon astronaut capsule, which ferried two cadres of NASA astronauts to the International Space Station last year.

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