“I have a feeling the crowd is about to go wild.”

First Person Views

SpaceX space tourists have successfully pulled off a daring stunt, becoming the first private civilians to go on a spacewalk. While orbiting the Earth at 458 miles, roughly twice the altitude of the International Space Station, billionaire and mission commander Jared Isaacman and crewmate Sarah Gillis carefully climbed outside the SpaceX Crew Dragon.

And the footage the space company managed to capture of the event is mesmerizing.

One camera angle — Isaacman’s first-person view —  is particularly entrancing, showing him undoing the spacecraft’s latch and slowly poking his head out of the capsule for the first time.

At first, the camera has to adjust to the Sun-lit Earth below, with Australia slowly becoming recognizable hundreds of miles below.

“The first views of the first-ever commercial spacewalk,” ground control can be heard saying. “I have a feeling the crowd is about to go wild.”

And as if on cue, SpaceX employees erupted into applause, as Isaacman slowly stepped up the spacecraft’s Skywalker ladder to reveal the astonishing view.

Stretching Legs

During their respective spacewalks, Isaacman and Gillis tested out their new EVA suits’ arm and leg mobility, systemically trying out different movements to provide feedback to the engineers who developed the suit back on the ground.

Besides their successful spacewalk, the crew also reached an apogee of 869 miles, the farthest from Earth that any human has ventured since NASA’s Apollo missions half a century ago.

While it’s been just shy of 60 years since Russian cosmonaut Alexei Leonov became the first human to perform a spacewalk, SpaceX’s achievement is still tremendous.

Isaacman’s first steps mark the beginning of a private space industry-led era in deep space exploration, setting the stage for future journeys — maybe even to the Moon and perhaps one day Mars.

More on the mission: SpaceX Drains Air From Spacecraft While Astronauts Are Inside