Who were the Axiom-2 astronauts?

Former NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, who commanded the mission, was joined by the first two Saudi Arabian government-sponsored astronauts: Ali Alqarni and Rayyanah Barnawi. Rounding out the crew was spaceflight participant John Shoffner, who privately funded his trip and became the first person from Alaska to fly to space.

Axiom did not release how much Shoffner and Saudi Arabia paid for the planned 10-day mission, but the company previously cited a ticket price of $55 million per seat.

Whitson flew the mission as an employee of Axiom Space. After retiring from NASA in 2018 as the record holder of the most time in space by an American, she joined Axiom Space as its director of human spaceflight. Her record now stands at 674 days in space, and with Axiom-2, she became the first woman to command a private spaceflight mission.

While in space, the crew "executed over 20 STEAM outreach engagements and over 20 different experiments, as well as eight media events," according to a statement by Axiom. Accompanying the crew on the return trip were the results of those experiments and over 300 pounds of cargo.

What's next for Axiom Space?

After opening the ISS to commercial activities and selecting Axiom as the organizer of the first two privately funded missions, NASA required the company to fly a former NASA astronaut as each mission's commander. That expectation is still in place for the third flight in the series, Axiom-3, which could launch as early as this fall. Former NASA astronaut Michael López-Alegría, Axiom's chief astronaut and commander of last year's Axiom-1 mission, will command that mission. Axiom hasn't yet released who will join López-Alegría.

Axiom Space uses lessons from these private missions as a training ground and stepping stone to building its own space station. The company is contracted with NASA to connect commercial modules to the ISS over the next few years before disengaging ahead of the station's planned retirement in 2030 to become a free-flying commercial destination in orbit.

An artist rendering depicts the exterior of the free-flying Axiom Station with decals depicting international partnerships. The Axiom Station will first begin as a single module attached to Node 2 of the ISS before detaching to become an independent space station in 2028.

Axiom-2, SpaceX's 10th human spaceflight mission, landed on the same day the company's first crewed mission, Demo-2, launched three years prior. In 2020, after nearly a decade-long hiatus caused by NASA's retirement of the space shuttle in 2011, Demo-2 returned human spaceflight capabilities to the U.S. In the time since, SpaceX has launched 38 humans to orbit on a combination of commercial missions like Axiom-2 and government-sponsored crewed missions for NASA and its international partners.

When is the next crewed launch?

Two more crewed missions to ISS are slated to launch from Florida later this summer.

The first demonstration flight of Boeing's Starliner capsule with astronauts onboard is tentatively scheduled to launch aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on July 21.

NASA's next rotational crew mission with SpaceX, Crew-7, sending NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, European Space Agency astronaut Andreas Mogensen, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Satoshi Furukawa, and another unnamed crew member to the ISS for a six-month stay is set for liftoff from KSC in mid-August.

When is Florida's next launch?

At KSC's pad 39, meanwhile, an uncrewed SpaceX Dragon capsule is targeting no earlier than 12:34 p.m. EDT Saturday, June 3, for the Space Coast's next launch. That mission will take thousands of pounds of supplies and cargo to the ISS.

A Starlink mission had previously been set to fly early Thursday, but was delayed in favor of better weather conditions later in the weekend. That mission, which will take dozens of internet satellites to low-Earth orbit, is set to fly sometime between 5 a.m. and 8 a.m. Sunday, June 4.

For the latest, visit floridatoday.com/launchschedule.

Contact Jamie Groh at JGroh@floridatoday.com and follow her on Twitter at @AlteredJamie.

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