Former HI-SEAS Crew Member Headed to Space on First All-Civilian Mission

One of the original crew members of the first University of Hawai‘i Hawaiʻi Space Exploration Analog and Simulation program (HI-SEAS) on Mauna Loa is headed into space as part of the world’s first all-civilian mission to orbit Earth, Inspiration4.

Geoscientist Sian Proctor was one of six crew members who emerged on Aug. 13, 2013, after spending four months at the HI-SEAS habitat as part of a NASA-funded study to investigate food strategies for long-duration space travel.

Inspiration4 has announced a 5-hour launch window beginning Wednesday, Sept. 15, 2021, from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The launch vehicle is a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.

The plan is for Inspiration4 to travel in a low Earth orbit on a multi-day journey. According to the mission website, the crew will conduct experiments while traveling weightless at more than 17,000 miles per hour.

Researchers will also collect environmental and biomedical data and biological samples from the four crew members, before, during and after the historic spaceflight.

HI-SEAS Principal Investigator and UH Mānoa Professor of Information and Computer Sciences Kim Binsted is planning to attend the launch.

The launch is scheduled for 8 p.m. EDT or 2 p.m. HST.