SpaceX successfully launches Polaris Dawn mission

SpaceX's Polaris Dawn space mission launched successfully on Tuesday, with the four astronauts on board embarking on a journey that will take them up to 1,400 kilometres away from Earth.

SpaceX says "the crew will endeavor to reach the highest Earth orbit" since the last Apollo missions to the moon in the early 1970s. By comparison, the International Space Station (ISS) is located around 400 kilometres from Earth.

Billionaire entrepreneur Jared Isaacman is leading the mission, which will last up to five days, in coordination with SpaceX founder Elon Musk, who will remain on the ground.

Isaacman, along with astronauts Kidd Poteet, Sarah Gillis and Anna Menon, lifted off aboard a Crew Dragon spacecraft with a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral spaceport on the west coast of Florida.

During the mission, the astronauts are to carry out the first commercial spacewalk, at an altitude of around 700 kilometres, during which the private space company is looking to test a new space suit, designed for use on potential missions to the moon and Mars.

The astronauts will also carry out experiments on the effects of space flight and space radiation on human health.

The launch of Polaris Dawn was postponed several times due to unfavourable weather conditions. The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) also temporarily withdrew the Falcon 9's launch permit due to an incident during an earlier launch.