Jared Isaacman completes first private spacewalk with Space X | BBC News

we start in space and history being made more than half a century after Neil Armstrong became the first person to walk on the moon well today the billionaire businessman Jared isaacman became the first nonprofessional astronaut to walk in space singon but his first words as he stepped outside the resilient spacecraft were beautiful world he used the first privately funded space walk to do Mobility tests on the new type of space suit that will be at the Forefront of the next generation of space exploration our science correspondent palab go has the story back at home we all have a lot of work to do but from here Earth Ser looks like a perfect world historic words for an historic moment out comes the first private sector astronaut to walk in space silhouetted in Earth's orbit billionaire Jared isman paid millions of dollars for this experience earlier he was suiting up as were the three other crew members the capsule has no airlock so the entire spacecraft is in the vacuum of space once the doors opened report one closed report two closed SpaceX dragon is ready for SE pressurization then the all important checks to make sure that the space suits don't leak they've been upgraded for The Space Walk stronger and more flexible and the helmets have a heads up display so they see how how well their bodies are coping then the air is taken out of the capsule so the pressure inside matches what's outside the hatch opens and isaacman exits the spacecraft there's not much to do outside apart from testing the suit so he floats around and enjoys the view before returning to the capsule then it's the turn of mission specialist Sarah Gillis she's trained for this moment for 2 years we really are hoping to bring back these this knowledge for the SpaceX team of how does a suit perform what did we you know really nail on the operation and in the training on the ground because this is a brand new training program for our SpaceX team um so I think we're going to be be doing a lot of of data finding fact finding that we can then bring back to make future spacewalk operations or you know future suit design even better it was 60 years ago that Alexi leonov became the first person to walk in space since then it's only been astronauts working for government space agencies to have done this until now this is the first ever private sector crew to have walked in space companies like SpaceX have done some things very differently they've built lots and lots of hardware and they've done lots of testing and we've all seen you know amazing explosions we've seen things go bang but each time they've learned from that process you know this could be a significant step it'll be really exciting to see what happens with the next Polaris Mission so there there are two more to come we've believe and you know what are the going to be the milestones for that that are going to be uh going to be addressed I can't wait the historic space walk now over the crew's attention turns to carrying out experiments before beginning their journey home in two days time palab go BBC News well let's head to Cardiff and speak to our science correspondent Gina Renard who was watching all those pictures it was absolutely spellbinding wasn't it watching that and it seemed to go like clockwork yes it was absolutely we had a very tense hour watching those pictures we were watching them inside the capsule and I did think it looks very small and and tight in there then of course we saw Jared Eisenman emerging up through that space and coming out he did he sort of moved his limbs his hands and feet to test the suit he went back in it went very quickly and then his colleague Sarah Gillis she did the same thing um we did have some feelings of of nervousness this was a very risky and quite dangerous operation um but of course it the the the mission was successful they've pulled it off and I'm sure Jared isman will be very pleased with his success he's funded this it's a we don't know the exact cost but just one seat on a SpaceX flight is uh considered to be $55 billion so he'll be really pleased that um this was a success and also he has seen that amazing view of Earth from just outside the Dragon capsule we're seeing those pictures uh now as you were talking to us we've now gone inside the capsule but you were talking about the potential dangers the potential Jeopardy there were many of those moments all of them passed off with no event take us through the next stages now so this is part of a six- day Mission the spacecraft launched on Tuesday this is the third day it's got two more days up in space it will um tomorrow we we think it will broadcast some sort of message uh on Saturday it will begin its descent um from the high orbit and then it will Splash down into the ocean off the coast of Florida where it'll be picked up but of course they'll be celebrating this success learning from it and I don't think this will be the last of the billionaires we see do a space walk and they'll be hoping that someday the the rest of us who who don't quite have that much money may have the opportunity to do our own our own space walks but that is probably still a long way off Georgina thanks very much well let's stay with this let's speak to the space scientist Dr Hena Khan doctor welcome here to the program I'm going to take us straight back to the pictures because they were quite incredible you were watching them live as they happened it's so interesting isn't it because astronauts will SP spend years in the training but that moment when they emerge they see that view of the earth it is an extraordinary moment that takes the breath away from everyone who's done it yeah no absolutely and uh you know I'm not one of those people that have done this but having seen the pictures I can imagine the the what it could feel like and what it might be like to have that that feeling to be out in in the vastness of of space um and whilst this has been the the privilege of a a very select few I think what's important to understand is that what's happened in order to for them to get here the development the the technology taken to build these new suits and experience that I think is is it's a collaborative effort for lots of different people hundreds of thousands of people who have worked on this moment to get these four individuals into this this situation tell me more then about the significance the suits that'll be part of what we need the next generation of space explanation you know those missions to Mars and elsewhere but also how do you see the significance of this the first commercial space walk yeah no I think that's there's two really interesting things I think the first like you said this is Paving the way for what we all know is the return to to the moon the return you know moving on to to the Mars and and you know kind of off-planet habitats and that's a clear objective for lots of different uh government agencies NASA the European space agencies as well as the commercial uh space flight environment so the testing of this I think is really exciting uh and making sure that as you said it's been a success but the broader context here within the commercial space environment is it's allowing indiv you know entities commercial industry bodies to be part of this journey we talked a little bit earlier uh one of your correspondents mentioned that you know commercial satellite development is already something that's happening um across the board so where it was the domain of of state run organizations now individual Industries and and companies can be building satellites and taking that technology to space this is another step in that where now you know space flight as well as space suit and then all the the detail that is required to to have individuals or uh people within the space domain it's opening that up to a much broader environment I'll come back to that point in a moment but so many extraordinary stories involved in what we've seen today Sarah Gillis who we saw make that second Space Walk she started at Space X as an intern didn't she and here she is doing a space walk like this making history yeah no absolutely and that's I think that's what's really exciting here is that whilst there's these few individuals with a loss of money who are able to furnish these things it's actually opening the door for for young people and for people who are interested in the space sector to to be able to have that opportunity SpaceX is a commercial organization it's a large company which has developed its own capability and we have companies um of a size here in the UK as well as across other uh Europe and elsewhere so you can imagine that young people and even with people within the sector are seeing there's opportunity here for us to be part of something much bigger yes I'm not saying that everybody gets to be in space no and everything about this is much bigger we saw at space H xhq them all breaking into Applause when that hatch opened and when the first Space Walk actually took place those first few steps it sort of underlines the point the massive amount of work that goes into something like this and you've got NASA with their trips back to the Moon your assessment finally of the pace of technological Advance we're seeing now so I think yes I think that's it I mean when we were a part of when we it was the domain of government agencies NASA and the likes there was a a direction of travel that was being dictated by those organizations now bringing it out into the commercial domain there's a highly competitive environment and competitiveness does Drive Innovation so it allows allows organizations to think about right what is the next opportunity that we can help push forward on this and so being able to like you said in the last 60 years be able to get to this point from a commercial standpoint I think is really really critical and it allows that opportunity to grow much broader than just the the select few organizations that might have done this in the past so it's an exciting time I think for for the sector as a whole it really is uh thank you for taking time to speak to us on today's program Dr Hina Khan thank you very much