Original subtitles

[Jeffrey Kluger] I like to think of it as humanity's great taunting.

Space taunts us because it's always there, it's always visible,

it's directly across the cosmic window.

Just on the other side of the glass

is this great expanse that we can see, we can imagine,

but we cannot touch. And that lure is irresistible.

Throughout human history, the enormity of space,

the great bowl of the sky has always inspired equal parts

reverence, awe, and mortal terror.

Space is the place we have been striving to go

since we first looked up at the stars.

And we have actually been going since 1957.

[newscaster] Today a new moon is in the sky:

a 23-inch metal sphere placed in orbit by a Russian rocket.

[JFK] We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things,

not because they are easy, but because they are hard.

[Kluger] The competition between the US and the Soviet Union

turbocharged the space race.

We went from a standing start, with no human being

ever having been off the planet,

to the surface of the moon in eight years.

[Neil Armstrong] It's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.

[Kluger] The Space Race 1.0 was the US and the Soviet Union.

Space Race 2.0 is suddenly the private sector saying,

"If I have the money, and I have the know-how, and I have the will,

I can go to space."

On July 11, we saw Richard Branson take his space plane 50 miles high...

[woman over radio] Three, two, one, release, release, release.

[Kluger] ...and gave its passengers about three and a half, four minutes

in space.

I'm an adult in a spaceship with lots of other wonderful adults!

[man over radio] ...two, one.

Ignition.

[Kluger] Nine days later, Jeff Bezos flew over 62 miles high.

They flew passengers on an 11-minute popgun suborbital space flight.

These were not small accomplishments.

What SpaceX's Inspiration4 mission is about to do is vastly more ambitious

and will change the game entirely.

For the first time, four civilians are going to space.

They will orbit the Earth for three days by themselves.

These are four non-professional astronauts

flying a spacecraft around and around the Earth.

This is a hinge point in history,

and will kick the doors open to space for the rest of us.

[Jared Isaacman] Inspiration4 is four people with very different backgrounds.

Every person who's gonna join this mission

has to be able to deliver a very powerful and inspiring story in their own right.

We represent inclusive, diverse access to space.

There have been three Black female American astronauts.

I will be number four.

[Hayley Arceneaux] I'll be the youngest American to go into orbit.

Also the first pediatric cancer survivor to go to space.

When I heard that they were offering me a seat, I had a flood of thoughts.

There's a lot of risk. What happens if something goes wrong?

I have a family.

What is that gonna do to her or what's it gonna do to our daughters?

[Kluger] It is a certainty

that we will become a multi-planet species.

And this is the next significant step

to other worlds deep beyond Earth.

And it starts now.

[dramatic orchestral music playing]

["Go Let It Out" by Oasis playing]

My name is Jared Isaacman, I'm 38 years old.

I'm commander of Inspiration4, first all-civilian mission to space.

♪ Life is precocious ♪

♪ In a most peculiar way ♪

♪ Sister psychosis Don't got a lot to say ♪

♪ She go let it out ♪

♪ She go let it out ♪

♪ She go let it out ♪

[Jared] I do believe you only get one crack at life.

To the extent you have the means to do so,

you have this obligation to live life to the fullest.

You never know when it's going to be your last day.

That kind of philosophy has taken me

from my first two flights around the world

which were both world record attempts in 2008 and 2009.

It's taken me to flying airshows as part of a seven-ship formation acrobatic team.

It's taken me to some interesting places in the world, like Antarctica,

on mountain climbing expeditions.

He's definitely adventurous.

I think he would tell you he's not a daredevil,

'cause he likes to calculate his risks, but he is like a daredevil.

[Jared] I just know how lucky I am, and a large part of it is because

I've had a very successful day job running a company that's...

that's afforded me these opportunities.

[reporter 1] Jared Isaacman had an idea that is now worth

more than $50 million. He figured out a way for businesses

to process credit cards more quickly.

[reporter 2] High school dropout turned businessman Jared Isaacman.

You're young, you created this great company, you make a lot of money...

You know, it's about opportunity.

[reporter 3] Jared's company grew more than 2000%.

[reporter 4] CEO Jared Isaacman is ringing the closing bell

of the New York Stock Exchange.

♪ Go let it out ♪

♪ Don't let it in Don't let it in, don't let it in ♪

Jared always, like, kinda keeps us on our toes.

Like, usually my feelings are like, "Oh, no. Here it comes."

[laughs] Like, what's next? But, that's just...

It's always been in him, like, since we started dating.

[Jared] I grew up with a pretty independent, you know, lifestyle.

If I wanted to get something done, I was gonna do it myself.

It's a big part of, you know, how my life ultimately shaped out.

I grew up in New Jersey, and, uh, I think I was a horrible student,

and I wasn't, like, happy in school, either.

So, I made the decision I wanted to leave school early

uh, when I was 15.

There's a pretty decent age gap between myself and my, uh,

my older siblings. They were out, kind of enjoying their lives

and having responsibility, and, I'm like, I gotta raise my hand

to ask permission to use the restroom in high school.

This doesn't make sense.

So, I left high school, I took my GED.

I started the business of what became Shift4 when I was 16.

It was like a, you know, you wake up, you know, at 7:30, 8:00 a.m.,

then you fall asleep on the keyboard at 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning.

And you just keep doing it over and over again.

After a couple years of doing that, I kinda remember telling my father,

like, I'm getting burned out, like, I gotta have something else

going on in my life right now.

From a pretty young age, I definitely took interest in aviation.

So I went to the local airport,

and I went to the flight school there.

We went up in a Cessna 172.

This is 2004 or 2005, flying. There's no Wi-Fi. It's super peaceful.

There's no one around to bug you and it's, I mean, it's very therapeutic.

And when I did, I was like, "Yeah, this is gonna be a thing now."

Once you know how to fly a single-engine propeller plane,

you wanna fly a twin-engine propeller plane, then you wanna fly jets.

Once you started going down that slope, it was like,

well, what comes next? Ex-military aircraft?

Can you fly fighter jets? And it turns out, you can.

[dramatic music playing]

And that led to airshow teams.

[dramatic music continues]

Jared and I met at an airshow while I was flying with the Thunderbirds.

That's my background, 20 years in the Air Force flying F16s.

And there's a lot of consistencies and comparisons to the space world.

Jared knew he was going to space.

He just didn't know who, what, or where, when, and how.

[woman] Start.

[man 1] T minus 15 seconds.

[Jared] 2008, based on my interest in aviation,

I got an invitation to watch the Soyuz go up.

- [man 1] Five, four, three, two, one. - [woman] Prime, and lift-off.

[man 1] Lift-off of the Soyuz rocket transporting Mike Fincke,

Yury Lonchacov, and Richard Garriott to their home in space.

[Jared] And it was amazing.

[man 2] Flight controller standing by for contact and capture

of the International Space Station.

[Jared] And it actually took a space tourist up, Richard Garriott

was up on that mission.

[man] Richard Garriott launched to the International Space Station

as a self-funded private astronaut.

So that was kind of my first exposure to the idea that maybe

we're progressing towards a world where it won't always

just be NASA astronauts and Russian cosmonauts

that are going into space.

[man 2] Garriott waving goodbye for the final time.

Twelve years later, in 2020, I was on a call,

and I was talking to people from SpaceX, and it was not related

to me going to space, or any human being going to space,

it was a very unrelated conversation. I did make a comment that, um,

"Whenever you guys are ready to really open this thing up,

just, like, keep me in mind."

And this was like a closing comment on a phone call. It was like,

"Well, actually we might be a lot more ready than you might think,

and if you want, you have the opportunity to be the first."

And I was just all over it.

[man] Our mission is...

[Poteet] You know when Jared wants to share something.

The way he says something, it's like, "Okay, he has something to share."

We were in New York for business purposes,

and we went for a run around Central Park,

and usually, he's on his earpiece, listening to some business podcast,

um, ignores me.

But this time he was talking.

He started to allude to the space mission,

and I didn't fully grasp what he was talking about.

He starts talking about how he met with SpaceX,

and this opportunity has presented itself,

and I'm like, "Is he really talking about going to space?"

"Like, there's no way." The more and more he explained,

the more details he provided, and I'm like "Dude, are you going to space?"

And he's like, "Yup."

And I'm like... "Holy shit."

In a matter of a couple weeks, we go from Jared telling me

he's gonna do this space thing, to here we are at SpaceX.

It was like, "This is for reals. Dude, you're going to space."

"That's insane."

[tour guide] Um, I thought what we would do is start out here

with this beautiful thing, this beautiful Falcon 9 rocket.

Um, and this rocket is a very special rocket.

Early on, there were talks that, like, one day he'd go to space.

I mean, you don't believe it when, like, somebody's telling you,

but I'm like, "All right, he's got dreams" and you kinda, like, accept them.

He broke the news.

Yeah, I think the tears definitely came down.

All you think is, "My spouse, my husband, father of my children,

is going to space."

We don't know the risk, right? You just automatically think, like,

"Wow, something can happen."

He's always been adventurous, so... this was just on a different level.

Okay, now everybody knows how to launch one, and how to land one.

You've got all the secret sauce.

Don't go make your own rocket company, okay?

[Jared] If you look at SpaceX, their vision right from the start is,

make humankind a multi-planetary species, because...

we got a lot of eggs in one basket here.

And it didn't go really well for the dinosaurs.

The reason I started SpaceX was to help make life multi-planetary,

to get humanity to Mars.

The future is vastly more exciting and interesting

if we're a space-faring civilization and a multi-planet species

than if we are not.

And I can't think of anything more exciting than going out there

- and being among the stars. - [cheers, applause]

[Musk] It's important for the future of humanity to be a multi-planet species,

so that we better understand the nature of the universe,

and also protects against some calamity on Earth.

The initial model of a rocket was

that it would be a use once, throw-away machine.

Now that's a big machine to throw away.

The Saturn V rocket cost $400 million to build and launch,

and that was in 1960s money.

And it was used a single time.

Elon saw something different. Elon believed we can reuse these rockets.

[crowd] Five, four, three, two, one.

Liftoff!

SpaceX was the first company to prove out reusability of rockets.

Reusability is the holy grail.

It's a profound breakthrough.

[crowd cheers]

[man] Successful separation, we're coming up on...

This was something that was not supposed to be able to be done.

["E-Pro" by Beck playing]

[crowd cheering]

[woman] And the Falcons have landed!

[cheering continues]

[Jared] His team that he assembled, that believe in his vision,

have done what no one thought was possible.

It's been six years since they first landed a rocket on a ship.

No one else has done it.

["E-Pro" continues playing]

[Musk] SpaceX today is responsible for about two-thirds of...

all of the Earth's payload to orbit last year.

We're the only means by which the United States

is able to get astronauts to the Space Station.

You start flying cargo, and then you're launching people for the first time,

and now we've done three missions with humans on board.

[man] Welcome back to Planet Earth, thanks for flying SpaceX.

The next chapter's definitely to make it more and more accessible

to regular folks.

We're gonna be flying civilians for the first time.

[Jared] Not in my zone yet.

It's hard, there's rockets being built around me and everything.

Inspiration4 will be another change point

in the history of space travel.

[Jared] We're calling the mission Inspiration4.

We chose this name because the principal mission objective is to inspire.

The number four is symbolic for several reasons.

There will be four crew members on this spacecraft,

and it will also be the fourth manned mission from the United States

since the space shuttle was retired almost a decade ago.

[woman] So, guys, from this point on, no photos will be allowed in the facility.

[Jared] I look at it as an immense challenge.

I'm so excited to get into the books and start getting in the simulator

and playing around with, uh, this great engineering marvel

you guys have created here.

[Musk] We're trying to make the dream of space accessible to anyone.

This Inspiration4 mission helps bring awareness

of spaceflight to a lot of people, makes it more personal.

Hopefully, as the name suggests, it inspires people about spaceflight.

You need pioneers like Jared in order to have the future mission

and ultimately making science fiction not fiction forever.

- [Jared] Morning, nice to see you. - [man] Nice to see you.

- Good! I'm Jared. - Sarah.

- Hey, Sarah. - Nice to meet you.

Nice to meet you as well. Cool.

[man] So, we're at a very exciting milestone with you here today, Jared,

with our kickoff.

As you know, I'm your mission manager.

Uh, as I mentioned, we want to talk trajectory.

For this Inspiration4 mission,

the launch will actually happen in three stages.

The Falcon rocket is called the Falcon 9 rocket,

for the simple reason that it has nine powerful engines

that are sufficient to accelerate a spacecraft to orbit.

The Falcon 9 has a first stage, has a second stage,

and stacked on top of that, is the Crew Dragon spacecraft.

It's the place where the astronauts live, it's the piece that will go into orbit.

When the Falcon 9 lifts off, it will get about halfway

to orbital altitude, and the first stage of the rocket will separate and fall away.

The second stage of the rocket will light and accelerate

the Crew Dragon spacecraft up to a continuous speed of about

17,500 miles an hour.

The second stage will fall away,

and the Dragon spacecraft will be the only part that goes into orbit.

That will be the home of the crew for the three days they're in orbit.

In order to orbit the Earth,

you have to be going at a continuous speed

of about 17,500 miles an hour.

When it's time to come home, they turn around

and they begin to decelerate.

And it slows them down just a little bit, so the spacecraft will descend

into the atmosphere.

A small parachute will pop out and slow them down,

sort of a braking parachute,

then bigger parachutes will pop out,

and then they will be traveling at just a few miles an hour,

and they will gently splash down in the Atlantic Ocean.

[mission manager] All right. Shall we? Nice touch to it.

- Who... Who's that? - [all laughing]

[Jared] Looks like he knows what he's doing.

[mission manager] That guy...

Jared is, um, an awesome person to be a partner

on this first all-civilian flight.

He has a ton of experience in flight as a pilot,

um, and does a lot of wild piloting stuff.

He also just has a great attitude. He's a complete supporter

of our mission at SpaceX to go multi-planetary,

and he's, uh, really a very humble partner,

a very knowledgeable partner, as well.

[Ericson] Jared's not the guy that's just showing up and saying,

"Hey, launch me to space."

He is fully committed and involved, kind of the perfect guy for this.

He's got a ton of flight experience.

He has the technical ability to understand.

[Jared] I just care that it has that new Dragon smell.

[Reed] Yeah, it'll be... this is, this is, yeah.

What do they call it? Certified pre-owned.

[all laughing]

Jared understands that exploration is all about pushing boundaries.

It's about going where you haven't been before.

So that would be like keeping an altitude roughly below 420 kilometers,

and I don't think there's any particular or any major benefit in going above ISS.

All right, any questions?

I think it would be interesting to maybe further explore

the option above ISS.

[Jared] I totally agree, and I guess, just curious on Dragon Certification,

since that does go a touch above that.

Intuitively, going slightly above would not present a problem,

but going above will start to stretch our margins.

And there may be other problems that I'm not aware of in other subsystems.

[man] Yeah, it's not one particular thing, it's just opening Pandora's box.

The question really is, "What are you looking for?"

"What's the driver for that higher altitude?"

You know, when people have asked us about just what we're trying to accomplish

with Inspiration4, if there is a Jetsons' world we're all living in

and people are hopping in their spaceship and cruising around,

at some point, it's gonna go a heck of a lot farther than the Space Station.

So, assuming that it could be mitigated, then, I think it is symbolic in that it is

that kind of pushing that one step a little bit forward,

for everything else, you know, to follow.

Yeah.

This is gonna send a statement, this is the first.

And the first comes with a great deal of responsibility, like,

what message do we wanna send with this?

No, and that's a really fair point. And that's part of the point of this mission.

- Yeah, we'll... - [Jared] Cool.

We'll talk more about this one offline internally.

- [Ericson] Yeah. - [Jared] We appreciate it...

- [Ericson] For sure. - [man] It's definitely huge.

[Ericson] Typically, a NASA mission inserts into a 200-kilometer orbit,

but now, we're gonna go about 575 kilometers high,

well above the International Space Station.

If we are going to go to Mars,

taking a stride in that direction,

it is vitally important. I think it speaks to, uh, really,

the intent of the mission, which is, hey, to now inspire, you know,

and you inspire by doing things that haven't been done before.

- Cool, man. - [Ericson] See you next week.

- Yeah, see you in a week. - All right. See you, brother.

[Ericson] What impressed me about Jared was

that it is a heartfelt passion of his, that he needs to do this right.

That he's setting a precedent for all the missions to come.

[interviewer] There's been a good amount of backlash

- to the so-called billionaires in space. - Sure.

The criticism is we have enough problems on Earth,

why are we spending time, energy, and money getting off of Earth?

What's your response to that?

Yeah, I mean, I don't think we should spend...

I think we should spend the majority of our resources

solving problems on Earth, um, like 99% plus

of our, you know, economy should be dedicated to solving problems on Earth,

but I think, maybe, something like 1% or less than 1%,

could be applied to extending life beyond Earth.

Think about a future where we're a space-faring civilization,

and a multi-planet species, that's an... an exciting, inspiring future.

If life is just about problems, I mean, why... what's the point of living?

Space is not inexpensive, like, we all know that.

What thoughts people can potentially have on it

is, you know, it's a billionaire going on a joyride,

the privileges of wealth, to be able to go and...

disregard all the, you know, uh, that could be done here on Earth.

For me, like, anytime I've undertaken any of these adventures in life,

there has to be some offset.

We're not gonna do this if we can't make a huge difference

for the problems the world's faced with today,

or we don't earn the right to go up into space.

We gravitated right to St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital.

[reporter] Isaacman says this mission is much more

than fulfilling a childhood dream.

It's also a massive fundraising effort

to raise an astonishing $200 million

for cancer research at St. Jude Children's Hospital.

And he's writing the first personal check for $100 million.

You definitely don't get into my position in life

unless a couple of things went your way at the right time.

And then you think about, well, the extreme other end of the spectrum

is the families where nothing went right,

they got dealt a horrible hand in life,

um, and... a lot of these kids in, you know, don't even grow up

and have a chance to experience even 1/100th, uh...

of what I've had the opportunity to experience, and it's just...

it's an imbalance that's... that sucks.

It's terrible. We should do something about it.

We live? Everyone can hear us?

Good, thumbs up? All right.

I wanna welcome the two most significant organizations

to this mission coming together for the first time:

SpaceX, obviously, you have no means to get to outer space

without all the great innovations and capabilities you brought together,

and St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital.

And why are we doing this?

To kick off what hopefully is the most successful fundraising

and awareness campaign in history.

If we are going to eventually live in a world

where everybody is capable of going out and journeying amongst the stars,

then we'd better fight childhood cancer along the way.

The other thing is, like, the rest of the crew members

have to represent the good we're trying to do with the mission.

We're not gonna go up with a bunch of fishing buddies.

It's not gonna work that way.

Like, every person who's gonna join this mission

has to be able to deliver a very powerful and inspiring story

in their own right.

And that's where we came up with our mission pillars.

Yeah, it might make sense just to explain, like,

that seat selection process and everything, you know?

We wanted a crew member to represent hope,

a crew member to represent generosity,

and a crew member to represent prosperity.

And there's my seat to represent leadership.

We are going out and identifying people to occupy those seats

that really represent the best of humanity.

So, for our crew member that represented hope,

we're teamed up so heavily with St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital,

I can't think of anyone better to represent the mission's spirit of hope

than a former cancer survivor who grew up

to become a healthcare professional.

And we went to St. Jude and said, "You know, surely you might know

somebody who, you know, who fits this profile."

We've already selected one person, uh, who's a great humanitarian,

a first responder, you know, a childhood cancer survivor,

treated at St. Jude, grew up to become a healthcare professional,

and now is still in the fight at St. Jude again helping other kids beat it.

My name is Hayley Arceneaux, I'm 29 years old, and I'm from Louisiana,

but I live in Memphis.

- Thank you. - [clerk] All right, have a great one.

[Hayley] Thank you.

I grew up in a really sweet, small town called St. Francisville

in Louisiana.

[Colleen] She was very friendly, and she loved meeting new people.

I'd always be like, "Don't talk to strangers,

don't go home with strangers," I thought she would think,

"That might be a nice adventure to go on..." and I was afraid of that.

That's how friendly she was.

[Hayley] And I just had this really happy childhood.

I was in dance, gymnastics, and tae kwon do.

I was in tae kwon do alongside my dad.

We would go to practice twice a week together.

And at age ten, I'd just gotten my black belt,

and then, I was having pain in my knee,

and the doctor said, you know, probably an overuse injury

from tae kwon do. I took some over-the-counter meds,

stayed out of tae kwon do for a week, felt better, um,

but then the pain started getting worse.

Well, I vividly remember the day that I found the lump.

We were walking to the car from school, and she was kind

of limping in the parking lot, and I was like, "What's the matter?"

And she said, "My knee hurts, my knee hurts."

So I said, "I'll look at it when we get home."

She was making pancakes. She said, "Let me look at your knee you were mentioning."

She looked at it and then she gasped. And I remember she went over

to the fire where the pancakes were and turned it off.

She kept saying, "How long have you had that?"

And she pointed to this knot on my knee, like right above my knee.

[Colleen] We went to the doctor the next morning.

I snuck out in the hall with the doctor, and I said,

"Could this be something serious?"

And the doctor just hugged me. She gave me this big bear hug,

and, at that point, I just knew.

She ended up being diagnosed with osteosarcoma,

which is bone cancer.

We returned home, and my dad immediately looked up

osteosarcoma online and found the St. Jude website.

In order to go to St. Jude, they have to have a protocol

that they're studying that type of cancer, which they were.

Hayley and I flew to Memphis.

I walked in and they had the reception desk.

And I said, "I'm here. My daughter is Hayl..."

and I just burst into tears.

I couldn't even finish saying her name.

And I remember, I just kind of stepped back,

and trying to compose myself, and I feel these arms around me.

And it was the receptionist, Miss Penny, and she whispered in my ear,

she said, "It's gonna be okay, it's gonna be okay."

"You're part of the St. Jude family now. We're going to take care of her,

and we're gonna take care of you too."

[Hayley] I underwent intensive chemotherapy for almost a year,

and, I remember I asked a lot of questions about losing my hair.

I was so worried about that.

And I remember being so worried that my dog wouldn't recognize me.

It all started with losing little pieces on my pillowcase.

Then it started coming out in chunks.

- I think we've been in this room before. - We've been in all the rooms.

Yes, we've been in every room.

[Colleen] She had 12 rounds of very intensive chemotherapy.

Her counts would drop, she wouldn't have any immunity, and, of course,

everything made her sick.

[Hayley] I had several infections, I needed numerous transfusions.

Midway through, I had surgery to remove the part of my bone

that had the tumor on it.

- [Hayley] Come in. - Hello! Hi, Hayley, how are you?

- [Hayley] Good. Here. It's numb. - It starts to... right here is numb...

- But I can feel all of my foot. - Okay.

When they removed the part of my bone that was affected by the tumor,

they removed the growth plate.

And St. Jude had this cutting-edge technology where they were able

to put in a prosthetic that could be expanded

without the need for additional surgery.

And, they did that. They expanded it five times.

Mom, I think I'm always gonna be a centimeter longer in this leg.

Well, you're only three-fourths of a centimeter longer right now.

- Oh! - Yeah.

[Hayley] I was a tough kid. I didn't cry much.

I tried to keep a really good attitude.

Hayley made an unbearable situation bearable.

I'm trying to lift my leg like my right leg, but, it's...

I can't do that yet.

[Colleen] I had to give her a shot every night,

and, I'd be like, "I'm sorry,"

and she'd be like, "That's okay," like, "Don't worry about it, it's okay."

And I always wanted to be very strong

for her to not have to do that... for her not to have to carry me along.

You're almost ready to run a race.

[Barnwell] Hayley, from day one,

wanted to make every day better for everybody.

[Hayley] I would go up to all the donors who were giving blood, and I would say,

"Thank you for donating. If I didn't get blood and platelets,

I would shrivel up."

They even made me a little St. Jude name badge that said

"Gratitude Administrator."

And I took my role really seriously, like, I would tell people,

"I am a St. Jude employee."

She would say time and time again, "I cannot wait to come back here

and help."

I remember thinking, "She'll do it, if she survives this, she'll do it."

- [Hayley] My scans are clean? - Yes.

- Yay! - Woohoo!

["Everything's Not Lost" playing]

♪ Come on, yeah ♪

♪ Oh, oh, yeah ♪

♪ Come on, yeah ♪

♪ Everything's not lost... ♪

[Hayley] My first reaction to when I had cancer was I'm going to die.

And I haven't died.

And I'm not going to die.

Spaghetti!

I come back every two months now for a check-up because I'm in remission.

That means the cancer is gone.

[man] Your hair looks a little different.

[Hayley] I just love St. Jude.

My dream is to be a nurse there.

♪ Everything's not lost ♪

[Hayley] I applied for a job in 2019 with in-patient leukemia at St. Jude.

I just knew that this was my team, these were my people.

- Hi, Hayley, how you doing? - I'm good, how are you?

When I got that email that I got the job, I could not stop crying.

I called my mom, and I was just bawling crying, and she was like,

"Hayley, stop crying. I don't know what you're saying."

And I was like, "I got a job!" [laughs]

That was the happiest moment of my life.

I'm Hayley. It's nice to meet you.

I heard a lot of really cool things about you.

Getting to interact with these kids and getting to show them

what their life can look like after cancer,

it's introduced me to the best people.

You know, whenever I was younger, I was a patient here.

I was treated for bone cancer.

Having cancer made me who I am.

[Hayley laughs]

And you can totally do this. If I can do it, you can definitely do it.

[boy] Thank you for telling me.

[Hayley] Aw. It was so good to meet you. You're awesome.

It definitely changed my life for the better.

And then, in early January, St. Jude sent me an email

saying they wanted to talk to me about a unique opportunity.

And so I went into this phone call, almost a little nervous.

I was just thinking, "What are they gonna ask?"

There's two people on the call, and one says to the other,

"All right, do you wanna explain it? Blast off?"

And I remember going, "Blast off?"

And then, they start telling me about Jared

and this all-civilian mission to space. And they absolutely shocked me

when they asked if I wanted to go.

And I looked down, my hands were shaking, I just couldn't believe it.

And then I thought, you know, "Let me check with my mom."

Hayley called me, she said, "Mom, you're never gonna believe that,

but it's true." She said, "They want me to go to space."

I said, "What?" And then I did ask her, like,

"Oh, well... how many astronauts are going?"

And that's when she said, "None."

And I said, "Why don't you call Hayden?"

Her brother, who's the airspace engineer. I said,

"Let's see what Hayden says."

And Hayden has always been the space boy.

We went to NASA several times over the years,

mostly because of his love for space.

He was at work that day, and I called him and I was like,

"You've gotta go outside, this is an emergency."

I go out and sit in this little, like, uh,

area that's separated from everyone and call,

I Facetime her, have my Airpods in so no one can hear, luckily.

She's like, "I don't know how to tell you this,

but I'm going to space." And I was like, "Space?"

"Wait, wait, you're going to space? Aren't you a PA? What? What's going on?"

I was... I was shocked.

I never thought in a million years she would get the opportunity

to go to space, right?

And I said, "I wanna do it," and he said, "You should do it."

And, I emailed St. Jude and I said, "I accept."

And I said, "I do have a couple questions. Are we going to the moon?"

I was like, "Did you ask questions,

like, how high are you going up, like, what's the plan?"

And she was like, "Yeah, I emailed them, asked them, are we going to the moon?"

And I was like, "Hayley, I guarantee you're not going to the moon."

And I was dying to tell people.

- How are you? - [woman on computer] Good, how are you?

I'm good! I have some really big news, but it's a secret.

- Yeah? You're freaking me out. - [laughs] It's good news!

- Do y'all have any guesses? - Okay, did you get promoted at work?

[Hayley] It's a lot bigger than that!

- Um... - What is it?

Okay. Winning a trip to outer space.

- Are you going? - I'm going to outer space.

No, you're not.

[laughs]

- What? Hayley! - I'm gonna be an astronaut.

I'm gonna know a freaking astronaut. Dude, we're gonna know

- a freaking astronaut! - And, of course, I want y'all to...

- That is so cool! - I want y'all to be there

- at the launch. - Yes! I wanna be there

at the freaking launch!

[laughs]

Y'all, can y'all believe I'm going to f... outer space?

[woman on phone] No, like, our best friend is going to space. What?

[laughs]

And then a few days later, I got to Zoom with Jared for the first time.

He went through Inspiration4, and, um, gave me all the information,

- answered all my questions. - [man] Showed you where the moon was.

[laughs] He said we were not going to the moon.

Apparently, people haven't gone there in decades.

- No... - I learned that.

Yeah, so we had a great call,

I was feeling so good about it. And the next week,

we were on our way to SpaceX.

["What A Difference A Day Makes" playing]

♪ What a difference a day made ♪

♪ Twenty-four little hours ♪

[Jared] Hayley obviously represents our mission pillar of hope.

I told them, I said, "I'm dying to tell my patients."

[Jared] Her official role in the mission is she's our medical officer,

and who could be better qualified than that? She's a physician assistant.

But she does bring a lot more than that too.

She's got toughness.

She faced a circumstance that could have ended very poorly,

like none of us have experienced, you know, at ten years old.

She overcame that.

Mila, Liv, do you guys know that Hayley is gonna be an astronaut?

- Yes. - We're gonna go to space together.

- [Jared] Isn't that cool? - Yeah.

I do think that in life, you should say yes to opportunities that scare you.

[tour guide] Welcome to the production floor!

This thing above me is...

the old version of the Dragon Capsule, but this is not the version

you're gonna fly in. You're getting a Ferrari. Yeah.

[laughter]

At the bottom, are there engines that are propelling us at...?

What is the speed?

Roughly 25 times the speed of sound, or 17,500 miles an hour.

- Oh, wow. - Yeah. It's, uh, kinda crazy.

I think such a beautiful part of life is you don't know

what's around the corner. That's why you hold on to hope

that there's gonna be better days.

[Jared] This is where we're gonna... we're gonna live for three days.

[Hayley] Home sweet home!

♪ And the difference... ♪

You know, this is awesome.

♪ ...is you ♪

We will head up to the training center,

where you'll get your suit measurements taken.

They'll be the most in-depth set of measurements you'll ever have.

- [woman] 5.6. - [man] 5.6.

- [woman] 5.2. - [man] 5.2.

[Hayley] Until this mission, these NASA astronauts,

they've been perfect, god-like specimens.

Physically perfect, brilliant, strong...

[man] And knee depth.

["The Times They Are A-Changin'" playing]

[Hayley] This'll probably be the larger knee.

♪ And admit that the waters Around you have grown ♪

I'm going to space not physically perfect. With this rod in my leg,

I would have immediately been disqualified.

I'll be the first person with a prosthetic body part

to go to space.

They don't know exactly how it's gonna go.

Now we're gonna find out.

♪ Then you better start swimmin' Or you'll sink like a stone ♪

♪ For the times they are a-changin' ♪

[Kluger] The presumption for space travel has always been,

"No, you are not qualified."

"It is up to you to prove to me that you are qualified to go."

John Glenn...

Jim Lovell...

Neil Armstrong...

Sally Ride...

Mae Jemison...

They were different from you and me.

But these folks, the Inspiration4 crew...

these people are you and me.

I can't wait to meet numbers three and four.

If you think about it, there are two random people going about their lives

and 30 days from now, they're gonna get fitted for a spacesuit.

This mission will open a different dimension in who gets to fly.

And in that sense, this is one of the most important missions ever flown.

♪ For the times they are a-changin' ♪

[dramatic orchestral music playing]