Axiom Mission 3 (or Ax-3) was a

private spaceflight Private spaceflight is any spaceflight development that is not conducted by a government agency, such as NASA or ESA. During the early decades of the Space Age, the government space agencies of the Soviet Union and United States pionee ...

to the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is a large space station that was Assembly of the International Space Station, assembled and is maintained in low Earth orbit by a collaboration of five space agencies and their contractors: NASA (United ...

. The flight launched on 18 January 2024, and lasted for 21 days, successfully splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean. It was operated by Axiom Space and used a

SpaceX Space Exploration Technologies Corp., commonly referred to as SpaceX, is an America, American space technology company headquartered at the SpaceX Starbase, Starbase development site in Starbase, Texas. Since its founding in 2002, the compa ...

Crew Dragon Dragon 2 is a class of partially reusable spacecraft developed, manufactured, and operated by the American space company SpaceX for flights to the International Space Station (ISS) and private spaceflight missions. The spacecraft, which consi ...

spacecraft. The booster, B1080, had previously flown Axiom-2, among other high-profile missions.

Muninn

The Swedish component of Ax-3 would be the ''Muninn'' mission with Marcus Wandt as the first ESA astronaut launched by a private space provider. Wandt was also the first member of the 2022 European Space Agency Astronaut Group to receive a spaceflight mission. The mission's name comes from one of

Odin Odin (; from ) is a widely revered god in Norse mythology and Germanic paganism. Most surviving information on Odin comes from Norse mythology, but he figures prominently in the recorded history of Northern Europe. This includes the Roman Em ...

's two ravens that together combined symbolize the human mind with Danish astronaut Andreas Mogensen being launched as part of the ''Huninn'' mission on SpaceX Crew-7. This was the first time that two Scandinavians were in space at the same time. Wandt conducted 20 experiments and participated in five educational programs from understanding the effects of space habitat designs on astronaut stress levels to exploring cellular structure changes and gene expression in microgravity. The mission's patch shows Muninn gliding around Earth to share the knowledge collected by Wandt. The dark blue circle represents Earth and includes lighter lines depicting Sweden.

Crew

All four crewmembers have backgrounds as military pilots.

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 ...

was the commander as an employee of Axiom; Walter Villadei from the

Italian Air Force The Italian Air Force (; AM, ) is the air force of the Italy, Italian Republic. The Italian Air Force was founded as an independent service arm on 28 March 1923 by Victor Emmanuel III of Italy, King Victor Emmanuel III as the ("Royal Air Force ...

was the mission pilot. The mission specialists were

Alper Gezeravcı Alper Gezeravcı (born 2 December 1979) is a military pilot and the first Turkish astronaut. He flew to International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is a large space station that was Assembly of the International Spac ...

who was the first astronaut from

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

; and Swedish project astronaut Marcus Wandt.

Mission

The crew lifted off on a Falcon 9 from LC-39A

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

to dock with the International Space Station for an intended mission duration of approximately two weeks.Axiom Space refines training for next private astronaut mission
18 October 2023. Final mission duration was 21 days; mission ended with a splashdown into the Atlantic Ocean on 9 February 2024.

Gallery

References

{{Orbital launches in 2024 2024 in Florida January 2024 in the United States February 2024 in the United States Spacecraft launched in 2024 Axiom Space Missions SpaceX human spaceflights International Space Station Kennedy Space Center Successful space missions

Muninn

Crew

Mission

Gallery

See also

References