Space tourists make history with first polar orbit and 50-year-first pacific splashdown | WATCH

Cape Canaveral: Four space tourists who orbited the North and South Poles have safely returned to Earth after their privately funded polar tour, splashing down in the Pacific Ocean on Friday.

Bitcoin investor Chun Wang chartered the SpaceX flight for himself and three others, using a Dragon capsule outfitted with a domed window offering 360-degree views of the polar caps and the vast landscape in between. Wang, who is originally from China and now a citizen of Malta, declined to disclose the cost of the 3½-day trip.

The group, who launched from NASA's Kennedy Space Centre on Monday night, returned to Earth off the Southern California coast. This historic flight was the first human spaceflight to circle the globe above both poles, and it marked the first Pacific splashdown for a space crew in 50 years.

Wang invited Norwegian filmmaker Jannicke Mikkelsen, German robotics researcher Rabea Rogge, and Australian polar guide Eric Philips to join him on the journey. All four passengers shared breathtaking views throughout their voyage.

“It is so epic because it is another kind of desert, so it just goes on and on and on all the way,” said Rogge in a video posted by Wang on X (formerly Twitter) while gazing down from orbit.

Mikkelsen, an avid photographer, brought camera equipment along and spent much of her time capturing the spectacular views.

While all four crew members experienced space motion sickness after reaching orbit, they were feeling much better by the second day of the journey, according to Wang. The group opened the window cover above the South Pole on day two, allowing them to witness the stunning scenery.

In addition to documenting the poles from 270 miles (430 km) above the Earth, Wang and his crew also conducted the first medical X-rays in space as part of a test, along with two dozen other science experiments. They named the mission Fram2, after the Norwegian ship that carried explorers to the poles over a century ago. A piece of the original ship's wooden deck was taken aboard the capsule as a tribute.

The medical tests continued after splashdown, with all four crew members exiting the capsule unaided, carrying bags of equipment for researchers to analyse their stability after returning from space. The crew celebrated their successful mission with triumphant fist pumps.

SpaceX explained that the decision to switch splashdown sites from Florida to the Pacific was made for safety reasons. Pacific splashdowns ensure that any surviving parts of the trunk—jettisoned near the end of the flight—fall into the ocean.

The last crew to return to Earth via a Pacific splashdown were the three NASA astronauts of the 1975 Apollo-Soyuz mission.