Axiom Space
Veteran NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson embarked on her fifth journey to space early Wednesday, this time as part of a private mission organized by Axiom Space.
Accompanied by three fellow astronauts from India, Poland, and Hungary, the launch marked a historic milestone as each of their countries celebrated their first missions to the International Space Station (ISS).
The mission, named Axiom Mission 4 (Ax-4), lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, at approximately 2:30 a.m. EDT (0630 GMT). The four-person crew traveled aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft mounted on a two-stage Falcon 9 rocket.
The launch, a collaborative effort between Texas-based Axiom Space and Elon Musk’s SpaceX, lit up the early morning sky with a glowing trail of yellowish exhaust as it soared over Florida’s Atlantic coast.
Footage from inside the Crew Dragon capsule showed the astronauts—clad in white-and-black pressure suits—calmly strapped into their seats as the rocket ascended into orbit. Roughly nine minutes after launch, the spacecraft successfully reached its preliminary orbit. “We’ve had an incredible ride uphill,” Whitson radioed to SpaceX mission control in California, confirming the smooth journey.
The Crew Dragon capsule, nicknamed “Grace,” was making its maiden flight and is now the fifth active spacecraft of its kind in SpaceX’s fleet. This mission also marks the first Crew Dragon launch since a recent political clash between Elon Musk and U.S. President Donald Trump, which had briefly put the spacecraft’s future in question.
The Ax-4 mission is expected to reach the ISS after a 28-hour orbital journey, with docking scheduled for Thursday morning. Once aboard, the team will join the seven current residents of the space station, including astronauts from the United States, Japan, and Russia. The Ax-4 crew will remain on the ISS for 14 days, conducting a series of microgravity research experiments.
The team includes Shubhanshu Shukla of India, Sławosz Uznański-Wiśniewski of Poland, and Tibor Kapu of Hungary, representing their nations’ return to human spaceflight after over four decades. Their mission signifies a significant leap in international participation in low-Earth orbit missions.
Whitson, now 65, serves as the mission commander and brings unparalleled experience. She retired from NASA in 2018 after a distinguished career, becoming the agency’s first female chief astronaut and the first woman to command the ISS. Including this latest mission, she has now spent 675 days in space—more than any other American.
The flight is Axiom Space’s fourth private mission to the ISS since 2022, as the Houston-based startup continues building its commercial astronaut program. Axiom was co-founded by a former NASA ISS program manager and aims to eventually construct a privately owned space station to succeed the ISS, which is expected to be decommissioned by 2030.
NASA continues to play a vital role in supporting commercial missions to the ISS, providing the launch site and assuming responsibility for the astronauts once they reach the orbiting laboratory. This collaboration reflects the growing role of public-private partnerships in shaping the future of human space exploration.
