Space and astronomy news
On Sunday, May 21, the 4-person crew of Axiom Mission 2 (Ax-2) blasted off to the International Space Station (ISS) on board a SpaceX Crew Dragon, and today, May 22, the private astronaut crew boarded the International Space Station for a scheduled 10-day stay.
Continue reading “Four Private Astronauts Are Now on the International Space Station”
SpaceX’s second private astronaut mission to the International Space Station (ISS), Axiom-2 aka Ax-2, which is sponsored Axiom Space, received a “go” for launch from NASA on May 15 followed by a stamp of approval from Mother Nature on May 19, and finally a completion of the Launch Readiness Review (LRR) on May 20. Liftoff is currently scheduled for May 21 at 5:37pm EDT (2:37pm PDT) from NASA Kennedy Space Center’s historic launch complex 39A, which was the launch site for all crewed Apollo-Saturn V launches starting with Apollo 8, along with Skylab, dozens of Space Shuttle launches, and starting in 2017 with SpaceX.
Continue reading “The Private Axiom-2 Mission is Almost Ready to Fly to the International Space Station”
NASA and its international partners have approved the crew lineup for Axiom Space’s second privately funded mission to the International Space Station — a lineup that includes the first Saudi woman cleared to go into orbit.
Two of the former crew members — former NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson and John Shoffner, a Tennessee business executive, race car driver and aviator — had previously been announced.
They’ll be joined by Ali AlQarni and Rayyannah Barnawi, representing Saudi Arabia’s national astronaut program. Only one other Saudi citizen — Sultan bin Salman Al Saud, who flew on the space shuttle Discovery in 1985 — has ever been in space. The 10-day Axiom Space mission, known as Ax-2, is currently scheduled for this spring.
Continue reading “Axiom’s U.S.-Saudi Crew Approved for Private Mission to Space Station”