Fram2 will be the company's first astronaut mission to land in the Pacific Ocean. Its predecessors all splashed down off Florida, but SpaceX is now shifting returns to the West Coast to minimize the chance that chunks of Crew Dragon's expendable trunk could damage property or hurt people during reentry.

The mission, funded and commanded by a cryptocurrency entrepreneur, was launched by SpaceX on Monday and has grabbed headlines for its flight path

A Falcon 9 rocket lifted off on Monday night, sending four amateur astronauts on an unprecedented journey around Earth’s poles. The mission is traveling where no crew has gone before, and SpaceX just revealed the first views of the planet’s chilly polar regions from above.