Watch | Polaris Dawn mission: Tech billionaire Jared Isaacman becomes first civilian to walk in space

Tech billionaire Jared Isaacman became the first civilian to conduct the spacewalk on Thursday. Teaming up with SpaceX, the five-day Polaris Dawn mission was launched into space with a four-member crew on Tuesday from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. 

Joining the small elite group of spacewalkers, Isaacman and his crew waited until the capsule was depressurised before opening the hatch. 

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All the crew onboard wore SpaceX’s new spacewalking suits, as the entire capsule was exposed to the vacuum of space. The suits offered protection to all the crew members from the harsh vacuum. 

The orbit was reduced by half to 458 miles (737 kilometres) for the spacewalk.

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Testing the spacewalking suit was one of the important tasks for the team. The spacewalking was expected to last for about two hours. Rather than the exact walking, it mostly involved stretching and movement of limbs. 

Isaacman had his hand or foot always attached to the capsule as he flexed his arms and legs. The hatch sported a walker-like structure for extra support. These are considered EVA- extravehicular activities, any activity done by an astronaut in outer space outside a spacecraft. 

According to experts, due to the microgravity situation nobody really ‘walks’ on the space. Any activity outside the spacecraft can be considered as spacewalking as there is movement outside the capsule in space, experts pointed out. 

After about 15 minutes outside, Isaacman was to be replaced by the SpaceX engineer Sarah Gillis to go through the same motions. 

So far about 263 people have conducted a spacewalk representing 12 countries.