The first fully private manned mission to the International Space Station (ISS), carrying four people, including a former astronaut, was launched Friday at 4:17 p.m. (Lisbon time), as scheduled.
The mission is being promoted by US space company Axiom Space, which has also used SpaceX North America to fly the four men to the International Space Station, where they will stay for nine days for scientific experiments (on stem cells and aging), educational activities and commercials.
On board the Crew Dragon Endeavor spacecraft, which was propelled by a Falcon 9 rocket, are Michael Lopez-Alegria (mission commander and former NASA astronaut), Eitan Stipe (former Israeli airline pilot), Larry Connor (US investor and private pilot) and Mark Bathy (entrepreneur Canadian).
The SpaceX spacecraft took off from the Kennedy Space Center, a base in Florida operated by NASA, a partner in Elon Musk’s pole company.
Crew Dragon Endeavor should be docked at EEI towards the end of Saturday morning.
Larry Connor, 72, who pilots the spacecraft, will be the third oldest person in space, while Eitan Steph will be the second Israeli in orbit.
The four crew members on the first space mission from Axium (Ax-1) will join four astronauts (three Americans and one German) and three astronauts (Russians) on the International Space Station. Due to the work they will be doing on the International Space Station, the members of Ax-1 refuse to be considered space tourists.
Crew Dragon Endeavor is expected to return to Earth on April 19.
Axiom Space was founded in 2016 with the goal of creating the first commercial space station, and its first module is expected to launch in 2024.
Prior to the Axiom space mission, SpaceX had already flown astronauts from NASA and its European counterpart, ESA, to the International Space Station, replacing the Russian long-distance transport provided by the Russian space agency Roscosmos’ Soyuz.
Last Saturday, Roscosmos announced it would make “concrete proposals” for dates to end cooperation on the International Space Station, after its Western counterparts refused to lift sanctions on Russian companies in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February.
On December 8, eccentric Japanese millionaire Yusaku Maezawa flew to EEI for a 12-day stay, thanks to a partnership between Roscosmos and Space Adventures, a US company that exclusively sells flights aboard the Soyuz spacecraft to the “home” of astronauts in orbit. Earth .
The International Space Station is the result of a partnership between NASA, the European Space Agency, Roscosmos and their Canadian counterparts, the Canadian Space Agency and Japan’s JAXA.
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