Ax-4 mission to ISS launches with Indian astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla on board

After multiple delays, Indian astronaut Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla’s Axiom-4 mission to the International Space Station (ISS) was launched on Wednesday from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. In his first message from the mission, Shubhanshu Shukla said that this is not the start of his journey, but the start of India’s human space programme. Group Captain Shukla, who is the pilot of the Ax-4 mission along with other four crew members embarked on a 28-hour journey to the ISS on a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft.

Aboard the spacecraft along with Shukla are mission specialists Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski of Poland and Tibor Kapu of Hungary, and commander Peggy Whitson of the United States, a former NASA astronaut who now works for the company Axiom Space-- which organizes private spaceflights, among other things.

Shukla, who is the mission pilot, is India's second astronaut going into space -- four decades after Wing Commander Rakesh Sharma made history in 1984. The 39-year-old fighter pilot was chosen by ISRO as the prime astronaut for this historic flight.

The mission had seen multiple delays since its initial schedule of May 29 due to various reasons, from problems in the launch vehicle and changes in pressure on ISS’ Zvezda module. The leak in Zvezda was first detected in 2019, and space agencies have been working for years to fix it. Repairs were carried out ahead of the Axiom-4 mission.

The Dragon finally lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Centre in Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 12.01 pm on Wednesday.

According to live updates…

At around 4.01 pm, the Crew Dragon Spacecraft conducted the hatch operating procedures after docking with the International Space Station (ISS). They are currently troubleshooting a pre-existing communication issue. The hard capture is completed following the soft mating. All 12 hooks have closed between the Crew Dragon spacecraft and the International Space Station. The post-docking cabin configuration now begins.