Four crew members are set to launch Wednesday on a privately funded mission to the International Space Station.
The mission, known as Ax-4, is expected to last about two weeks at the International Space Station.
Shukla, Uznański-Wiśniewski and Kapu will make history by becoming the first people from their countries to live and work on the International Space Station.
If the launch goes according to plan, the four astronauts will dock at the space station on Thursday at around 12:30 p.m.
The upcoming flight will be Axiom Space’s fourth crewed mission to the International Space Station.
On Wednesday, a privately funded mission to the International Space Station is scheduled to launch with four crew members.
Planned by Axiom Space, a Houston-based company, the flight is scheduled to take off at 8 a.m. M. ET from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. A SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule on a Falcon 9 rocket will carry the quartet into orbit.
Starting at 7:05 a.m., NASA will provide live coverage of the launch.
The flight was scheduled to launch Tuesday but high winds along the Florida coast forced a one-day delay. The mission, known as Ax-4, is expected to last about two weeks at the International Space Station.
The mission will be led by retired NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, who has already logged a record 675 days in space — more than any other American astronaut. Joining her will be pilot Shubhanshu Shukla, an astronaut with the Indian Space Research Organization; mission specialist Sławosz Uznański-Wiśniewski, a Polish scientist with the European Space Agency; and mission specialist Tibor Kapu, a mechanical engineer from Hungary.
Shukla, Uznański-Wiśniewski and Kapu will make history by becoming the first people from their countries to live and work on the International Space Station.
During their two-week stay at the orbiting lab, the Ax-4 crew members will conduct a host of scientific experiments, according to NASA, including studies of muscle regeneration, how sprouts and edible microalgae grow in microgravity and how tiny aquatic organisms survive at the ISS.
If the launch goes according to plan, the four astronauts will dock at the space station on Thursday at around 12:30 p. m. ET.
The upcoming flight will be Axiom Space’s fourth crewed mission to the International Space Station. The company’s first private expedition to the ISS was in 2022 with an all-civilian crew. m. ET on NASA+.
