Axiom Mission 1 (or Ax-1) was a privately funded and operated

crewed mission Human spaceflight (also referred to as manned spaceflight or crewed spaceflight) is spaceflight with a crew or passengers aboard a spacecraft, often with the spacecraft being operated directly by the onboard human crew. Spacecraft can also be ...

to the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA ...

(ISS). The mission was operated by

Axiom Space Axiom Space, Inc., also known as Axiom, is an American privately funded space infrastructure developer headquartered in Houston, Texas. Founded in 2016 by Michael T. Suffredini and Kam Ghaffarian, the company first flew a spaceflight in 20 ...

out of Axiom's Mission Control Center MCC-A in Houston, Texas. The flight launched on 8 April 2022 from

Kennedy Space Center The John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC, originally known as the NASA Launch Operations Center), located on Merritt Island, Florida, is one of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) ten field centers. Since December 1968 ...

in Florida. The spacecraft used was a

SpaceX Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) is an American spacecraft manufacturer, launcher, and a satellite communications corporation headquartered in Hawthorne, California. It was founded in 2002 by Elon Musk with the stated goal of ...

Crew Dragon Dragon 2 is a class of partially reusable spacecraft developed and manufactured by American aerospace manufacturer SpaceX, primarily for flights to the International Space Station (ISS). SpaceX has also launched private missions such as Ins ...

. The crew consisted of

Michael López-Alegría Michael López-Alegría (born Miguel Eladio López Alegría on May 30, 1958) is an astronaut, test pilot and commercial astronaut with dual nationality, American and Spanish; a veteran of three Space Shuttle missions and one International Space ...

, an American born in Spain and a professionally trained astronaut hired by Axiom,

Eytan Stibbe Eytan Meir Stibbe is an Israeli former fighter pilot, businessman and commercial astronaut. In November 2020 he paid Axiom Space to become a space tourist on a ten day mission to the International Space Station aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon sp ...

from

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

Larry Connor Larry Connor (January 7, 1950) is an American real estate and technology business person, as well as a space tourist. Connor is the head of the Connor Group, a real estate investment firm located in Dayton, Ohio. Education Born in 1950 in Alb ...

from the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

, and Mark Pathy from

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

Background

was founded in 2016 with the goal of creating the world's first commercial space station. In early 2020,

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...

announced that Axiom had been granted access to the forward port of the

ISS The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA (J ...

' ''

Harmony In music, harmony is the process by which individual sounds are joined together or composed into whole units or compositions. Often, the term harmony refers to simultaneously occurring frequencies, pitches ( tones, notes), or chords. However ...

'' module, to which Axiom plans to berth the first node of the

Axiom Orbital Segment Axiom Orbital Segment or Axiom Segment (or AxS) are the planned modular components of the International Space Station (ISS) designed by Axiom Space for commercial space activities. Axiom Space gained initial NASA approval for the venture in J ...

; a complex that could grow to five pressurized modules after 2024 with a large observation window – similar to the current ''

Cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, most often dome-like, tall structure on top of a building. Often used to provide a lookout or to admit light and air, it usually crowns a larger roof or dome. The word derives, via Italian, from ...

'' mounted on the Nadir side of ''

Tranquility Tranquillity (also spelled tranquility) is the quality or state of being tranquil; that is, calm, serene, and worry-free. The word tranquillity appears in numerous texts ranging from the religious writings of Buddhism, where the term ''passaddhi'' ...

''. This new addition to the ISS will be able to facilitate the company's activities in

low Earth orbit A low Earth orbit (LEO) is an orbit around Earth with a period of 128 minutes or less (making at least 11.25 orbits per day) and an eccentricity less than 0.25. Most of the artificial objects in outer space are in LEO, with an altitude never mor ...

. Prior to the first module's launch as early as 2024, Axiom planned to organize and fly crewed missions to the ISS, consisting of either paying private astronauts or

astronaut An astronaut (from the Ancient Greek (), meaning 'star', and (), meaning 'sailor') is a person trained, equipped, and deployed by a human spaceflight program to serve as a commander or crew member aboard a spacecraft. Although generally r ...

s from public agencies or private organizations. In March 2020, Axiom announced they would charter a flight to the ISS with

spacecraft as early as late 2021. This mission is the first wholly commercially-operated crewed mission to the ISS, and one of the first dedicated orbital private crew missions, alongside

Roscosmos The State Space Corporation "Roscosmos" (russian: Государственная корпорация по космической деятельности «Роскосмос»), commonly known simply as Roscosmos (russian: Роскосмос) ...

Soyuz MS-20 Soyuz MS-20 was a Russian Soyuz spaceflight to the International Space Station (ISS) launched on 8 December 2021. Unlike previous Soyuz flights to the ISS, Soyuz MS-20 did not deliver any crew members for an ISS Expedition or serve as a lifebo ...

mission in December 2021. Following their first flight, Axiom plans to offer crewed flights to the ISS as often as twice per year, "aligning with the flight opportunities as they are made available by NASA".

Crew

Michael López-Alegría was chosen as a commercial astronaut. The other three seats were reserved for

space tourists Space tourism is human space travel for recreational purposes. There are several different types of space tourism, including orbital, suborbital and lunar space tourism. During the period from 2001 to 2009, seven space tourists made eight s ...

, announced to cost US$55 million each. Following the launch of

Crew Dragon Demo-2 Crew Dragon Demo-2 (officially Crew Demo-2, SpaceX Demo-2, or Demonstration Mission-2) was the first crewed test flight of the Crew Dragon spacecraft. The spacecraft, named '' Endeavour'', launched on 30 May 2020 on a Falcon 9 booster, and carr ...

in May 2020, the first crewed test flight of

Dragon 2 Dragon 2 is a class of partially reusable spacecraft developed and manufactured by American aerospace manufacturer SpaceX, primarily for flights to the International Space Station (ISS). SpaceX has also launched private missions such as Ins ...

, Axiom CEO Michael Suffredini said that they planned to announce the names of the crew in "a month or so"; Ars Technica reported that the full crew complement would "probably be unveiled in January 2021". On 26 January 2021, Axiom revealed the full crew of the mission, consisting of Michael López-Alegría, Larry Connor, Mark Pathy and Eytan Stibbe. They also announced

Peggy Whitson Peggy Annette Whitson (born February 9, 1960) is an American biochemistry researcher, retired NASA astronaut, and former NASA Chief Astronaut. Whitson has a total of 665 days in space, more than any other woman or American. Her first space mi ...

as the backup commander for the mission and John Shoffner as backup pilot. Eytan Stibbe's backup was his daughter Dr. Shir Stibbe. Michael Lopez-Alegria is a former NASA astronaut and Axiom Space VP. John Shoffner is an airshow pilot and entrepreneur, and not an Axiom employee nor a government trained astronaut. Peggy Whitson is a former NASA astronaut and Axiom consultant. It was reported that actor

Tom Cruise Thomas Cruise Mapother IV (born July 3, 1962), known professionally as Tom Cruise, is an American actor and producer. One of the world's highest-paid actors, he has received various accolades, including an Honorary Palme d'Or and three Gol ...

and film producer

Doug Liman Douglas Eric Liman (; born July 24, 1965) is an American film director and producer. He is known for directing the films '' Swingers'' (1996), '' Go'' (1999), '' The Bourne Identity'' (2002), '' Mr. & Mrs. Smith'' (2005), ''Jumper'' (2008), ''Edg ...

would be passengers for a movie project, but it was later announced they will fly on a subsequent flight.

Prime crew

Backup crew

Mission

Axiom-1 Liftoff (KSC-20220408PH-KLS01 0031)

The mission launched at 11:17 EDT on 8 April 2022. It launched atop a

Falcon 9 Block 5 Falcon 9 Block 5 is a Reusable launch system#Partial reusable launch systems, partially reusable two-stage-to-orbit medium-lift launch vehicle designed and manufactured in the United States by SpaceX. It is the fifth version of Falcon 9 Full Thr ...

launch vehicle from

Launch Complex 39A Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) is the first of Launch Complex 39's three launch pads, located at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Merritt Island, Florida. The pad, along with Launch Complex 39B, were first designed for the Saturn V launch vehicle. Ty ...

(LC-39A), a NASA-owned launch pad leased to SpaceX for Falcon 9 launches. The mission was flown aboard

''Endeavour'', which previously supported the

and

SpaceX Crew-2 SpaceX Crew-2 was the second operational flight of a Crew Dragon spacecraft, and the third overall crewed orbital flight of the Commercial Crew Program. The mission was launched on 23 April 2021 at 09:49:02 UTC, and docked to the Internationa ...

missions. From there the spacecraft spent less than a day in transit to the station and dock with ''Harmony'', where they were planned to spend ten days aboard the International Space Station (ISS). Following their time on the ISS, the spacecraft undocked with plans to return to

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...

via a

splashdown Splashdown is the method of landing a spacecraft by parachute in a body of water. It was used by crewed American space capsules prior to the Space Shuttle program, by SpaceX Dragon and Dragon 2 capsules and by NASA's Orion Multipurpose Crew ...

in the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

. Bad weather in the landing zone delayed the return, as result the crew spent 16 days docked to the ISS for a total of 17 days in orbit. It was revealed that the "zero-g indicator" aboard the first private mission to visit the International Space Station was a toy dog called ''Caramel'', the mascot for the Montreal Children's Hospital Foundation. During their days aboard the

, the private crew conducted more than 25 different research experiments. The Israeli mission segment is called ''Rakia'', which means sky in

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

and is also the title of the book published with

Ilan Ramon Ilan Ramon ( he, אילן רמון; , born Ilan Wolfferman ; June 20, 1954 – February 1, 2003) was an Israeli fighter pilot and later the first Israeli astronaut. Ramon was a Space Shuttle payload specialist of STS-107, the fatal mission of ...

's diary fragments that survived the 2003 Space Shuttle ''Columbia'' disaster. Connor also carried aboard three items on behalf of the

Armstrong Air & Space Museum The Armstrong Air & Space Museum is a museum in Wapakoneta, Ohio, the hometown of aviator and astronaut Neil Armstrong, the first man to set foot on the Moon. Opened in 1972, the museum chronicles Ohio's contributions to the history of aeronaut ...

. With Connor being an Ohio-native, the items included a

John Glenn John Herschel Glenn Jr. (July 18, 1921 – December 8, 2016) was an American Marine Corps aviator, engineer, astronaut, businessman, and politician. He was the third American in space, and the first American to orbit the Earth, circling ...

senatorial campaign button, a patch of the Armstrong Air & Space Museum, and a piece of Kapton foil removed from the

Apollo 11 Apollo 11 (July 16–24, 1969) was the American spaceflight that first landed humans on the Moon. Commander Neil Armstrong and lunar module pilot Buzz Aldrin landed the Apollo Lunar Module ''Eagle'' on July 20, 1969, at 20:17 UTC, an ...

Command Module after splashdown.

References