First fully private mission Ax-1 departs International Space Station

Axiom Mission 1 - the first fully private mission to the International Space Station (ISS) - undocked from the space station on April 24, 2022.  

The Ax-1 astronaut crew, aboard the SpaceX Dragon capsule named Endevour, is currently on their way back to Earth and will reach the Florida coast in the United States at 17:06 GMT on April 25, 2022, if everything goes according to plan. 

The Ax-1 crew was initially supposed to undock from the ISS on April 19, 2022. However, the bad weather conditions caused a delay of six days.  

The mission has been organized by Axiom Space, a company which aims to build additional modules for the ISS and eventually develop them into a separate space station.  

The crew consists of Larry Connor from the US, Eytan Stibbe from Israel, Mark Pathy from Canada and the commander Michael Lopez-Algeria, a seasoned Spanish-American astronaut who has already performed four space flights with NASA.  

Initially, the American actor Tom Cruise and director Doug Liman were planned to be on this flight, with the aim of shooting a film scene in space. However, the composition of the crew has been changed. Cruise and Liman are now expected to reach the ISS later in 2022.