Indian astronaut Shukla Axiom-4 mission set for June 10 lift-off, dock at ISS after 28-hour flight
The Hindu
Axiom-4 mission pilot Mr. Shukla, with crew, embarks on historic spaceflight to ISS, conducting food experiments for ISRO.
Indian astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla and three others are set to embark on Axiom Space's fourth human spaceflight from NASA's Kennedy Space Centre in Florida on June 10 and are likely to dock at the International Space Station on June 11 at about 10 PM IST, after a nearly 28-hour journey.
Mr. Shukla, the mission pilot of the Axiom-4 (Ax4) commercial mission to the ISS, will be accompanied by mission commander Peggy Whitson and specialists Tibor Kapu from Hungary and Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski from Poland.
The Axiom-4 mission will mark India's return to space 41 years after Rakesh Sharma's historic spaceflight onboard Russia's Soyuz mission in 1984.
"The crew will travel to the orbiting laboratory on a new SpaceX Dragon spacecraft after launching on the company's Falcon 9 rocket. The targeted docking time is approximately 12:30 p.m. EDT (10:00 p.m. IST), Wednesday, June 11," NASA said in a statement.
ISRO Chairman V. Narayanan visited Axiom Space last week to review the preparations for the spaceflight.
The astronauts have been in quarantine since May 25 to prepare for the trip and have been training ahead of the launch on June 10.
"The #Ax4 crew undergoes extensive emergency training, featuring a range of scenarios such as underwater escape drills," Axiom Space said in a post on X, and shared a video of the training programme.
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