“Here we are at the conclusion of an incredible mission, and I must say the teams exceeded every expectation,” Amir Blachman, chief business officer of Axiom Space, said on the joint Axiom/SpaceX webcast after splashdown. “We could not be more proud of what has just been accomplished.”
“Overall, this has been an amazing success. The crew performed beyond expectations,” said Derek Hassmann, operations director at Axiom Space, in call with reporters after splashdown. The additional time in orbit, he said, allowed the private astronauts to complete a “handful” of experiments they deferred earlier in the mission as well as perform additional outreach events. “Our Ax-1 crew pitched in on the general care and feeding and upkeep of ISS.”
The departure and return of Ax-1 allows NASA to proceed with the launch of a new set of professional astronauts to the ISS. The Crew-4 mission is scheduled to launch on another Crew Dragon spacecraft, Freedom, April 27 at 3:52 a.m. Eastern. It will deliver the Crew-4 astronauts of Kjell Lindgren, Bob Hines and Jessica Watson of NASA and Samantha Cristoforetti of the European Space Agency to the ISS.
The tight turnaround — less than 39 hours between splashdown and the scheduled Crew-4 launch — won’t be an issue, said Benji Reed, senior director of human spaceflight programs at SpaceX. Both SpaceX and NASA were reviewing data from the Ax-1 mission throughout the flight, and he indicated no issues with the spacecraft. “Everything is looking great for our launch of Crew-4.”
Approximately five days after the arrival of Crew-4, the Crew-3 astronauts of Raja Chari, Thomas Marshburn and Kayla Barron of NASA and Matthias Maurer of ESA will return to Earth on another Crew Dragon spacecraft, ending a mission that started with their launch to the station in November 2021.
Ax-1 was the first in a series of private astronaut missions to the station planned by Axiom Space before it installed a private module on the station, scheduled for as soon as 2024. Hassmann said the next mission, Ax-2, was tentatively scheduled for early spring of 2023. The company previously announced that former NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson will command Ax-2 with an Axiom customer, John Shoffner, as pilot.
Axiom has not announced who the other two members of the Ax-2 will be. “I believe you will hear something relatively soon” about those other crew members, he said. “Probably in the next few weeks.”
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