Throughout history, humanity has gazed up to the stars, pondering the limitless possibilities they possess. In the past 60 years alone, mankind has begun making those dreams a reality, sending men into orbit and the moon. The numerous space programs that achieved these great accomplishments have one thing in common: they have all been funded and backed by the program’s country of origin. Until recently, the possibility of a privately owned space program was thought impossible. The privately funded company, SpaceX is committed to developing space-exploration projects and other space programs .

SpaceX was founded in 2002 by the South-African born, Canadian-American inventor, Elon Musk. Elon Musk has successfully founded and co-founded numerous companies, including Zip2, Paypal and Tesla Motors. Musk took an interest in space-exploration technologies and founded SpaceX. The company’s purpose was to improve and innovate space exploration technologies and bring the prospect of space travel to the masses.

SpaceX has accomplished many historic achievements, including the first privately funded, liquid fueled rocket to reach orbit, the Falcon 1. On July 14, 2009, Falcon 1 successfully delivered the Malaysian RazakSat satellite into orbit in SpaceX’s first commercial launch.

Other achievements of SpaceX include the first privately funded mission to retrieve a spacecraft in space and transportation to the international space station. SpaceX plans to reduce space-travel costs and enable the colonization of Mars.

SpaceX has successfully collaborated with other famous space programs like NASA in the past. On August 18, 2006 NASA announced that SpaceX had won a Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) contract from NASA. This enables the SpaceX program to send cargo goods to the International Space Station and with the possibility of crew transport.

On August 3, 2012, NASA announced that they were collaborating with SpaceX to develop the next generation of manned space shuttle vehicles, enabling a launch of astronauts from U.S soil in the next five years.

 Even after Virgin Galactic’s disastrous mission that killed one pilot and injured another, Wilmington Friends School students seemed upbeat about the future of SpaceX. Jake Nolen, ‘17, said, “I think SpaceX is a step in the right direction because it will help our astronauts get into space from the U.S. instead of foreign countries.” Andrew Slomski, ‘17, stated, “ they seem to be doing good things because they want to bring privatization to the space industry, which would help move it forward.” SpaceX seems to be an intriguing step forward in the history of space exploration. The impressive achievements, and goals for the future will mark SpaceX’s place in the history of space exploration and travel.