Three businessmen and a former astronaut took off this Friday the first completely private mission to the International Space Station (ISS). They did it aboard a SpaceX rocket that left the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
Since 2000, several rookies have traveled to the ISS. Russia last year sent a film crew and a Japanese billionaire. But they all did it aboard Soyuz rockets and accompanied by cosmonauts.
The trip was organized by the Axiom Space company, in collaboration with SpaceX and NASA. “We are expanding the land frontiers of commerce into space,” said Bill Nelson, head of the US space agency, shortly before liftoff.
The former astronaut traveling with the businessmen is Michael López-Alegría. He is the commander of the mission, called Ax-1.
The three businessmen traveled millions of dollars to participate in the mission. One of them is the American Larry Connor, owner of a real estate firm who plays the role of the pilot on this trip.
Another of those traveling is Canadian Mark Pathy, head of an investment firm. And the third is former pilot Eytan Stibbe, co-founder of an investment fund.
Stibbe is the second Israeli astronaut in history. The first was Ilan Ramon, who died in 2003 in the explosion of the American space shuttle Columbia on his return from the ISS.
Scientific experiments
During the mission, some 25 experiences on aging, heart health or stem cells will be carried out. For this reason, the members of the Ax-1 reject the description of space tourists.
“The experiments I’m taking up there, coming from Canadian universities and research institutes, probably mightn’t have been done in space without this mission,” Pathy said.
“I think it’s important to differentiate special tourists from private astronauts,” Connor said. The first “spend 10 to 15 hours training (and) five to ten minutes in space (…) We spend between 750 and more than 1,000 hours training.”
Both he and Lopez-Alegria were trained in SpaceX’s Dragon capsule system. The training included, among other things, how to carry out daily life tasks in zero gravity and also how to react in the event of an emergency situation on the station.
Even so, the training of the members of the As-1S is less exhaustive than that of professional astronauts, who must be able to go out into space or repair equipment.
The private space station project
The Dragon capsule is due to dock with the ISS on Saturday. Upon arrival, the team will visit the station before getting down to business.
It is the sixth time that SpaceX has flown with humans (the fifth to the ISS). The first flight took place less than two years ago.
Axiom Space has concluded a four-mission agreement with SpaceX, and NASA has formally approved the start of a second, Ax-2.
For Axiom Space it will be the beginning of a stage towards an ambitious goal: the construction of its own space station. “It’s important for us to be able to repeat” these missions “on a smaller scale,” said Michael Suffredini, head of the company.
The first module of the private station is scheduled to be launched in September 2024. The structure will first be attached to the ISS before becoming autonomous when the orbiting laboratory is deactivated, which is expected around 2030.
NASA wants to generate income from these private missions and, in the long term, not have to manage the operation of a station but rather rent the services of private structures to concentrate on distant exploration.
