Just a few months away from becoming the second Indian to travel to space — the first in 40 years — Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla on Thursday said he was embarking on a journey on behalf of 1.4 billion people of India, and wanted each one of them to share his experience. Speaking at an online press conference of the Axiom 4 mission from the United States, Shukla (40), who is one of the four astronauts travelling to the International Space Station, said he hoped that his journey would inspire a whole generation of Indians to undertake similar missions in future. The mission is being operated by private space company Axiom Space in partnership with NASA and SpaceX. “While we are in the station for two weeks, we will be performing several scientific missions and conducting several outreach events. I know that right now an entire team is working to ensure that every minute we spend on the station is scheduled for activities to optimise our time there. Our endeavour is to execute this mission with utmost professionalism. I also hope to ignite the curiosity of an entire generation in my country through my mission and drive the innovation that would make many such missions possible in the future,” Shukla said. “I also have a personal agenda, of capturing my experience of onboard the station through pictures and videos so that I can share these with all the Bharatwaasis back home. I want them to share this thrilling experience with my eyes. For I truly believe that even though I, as an individual, am travelling to space, this is the journey of 1.4 billion people,” he said. Shukla is one of the four Indian Air Force (IAF) officers selected for Gaganyaan, India’s own human spaceflight mission which is now tentatively slated for 2026. The Axiom 4 mission, a result of partnership between ISRO and NASA, materialised before the Gaganyaan mission. The launch date for Axiom 4 mission, which Shukla will pilot, has not been finalised yet. The company says it would happen “no earlier than Spring of 2025”, which means anytime between March and June. Just like Shukla, two other astronauts on this mission, Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski from Poland and Tibor Kapu from Hungary, also happen to be the second ever from their respective countries to travel to space. Incidentally, the first human spaceflight of these two countries also happened about four decades ago. The fourth astronaut, Peggy Whitson, is from the US. Shukla revealed that he was in constant touch with Rakesh Sharma, the first Indian to go to space, and was seeking his advice and guidance. Sharma had gone to space aboard a Soviet mission in 1984. “Wing Commander Rakesh Sharma has been actively involved in the (Gaganyaan) process, from selection of the astronauts to the kind of training we are undergoing. He is really involved with the human space mission that we are already executing. We regularly keep in touch. He is a kind of mentor for me and is advising me on a lot of things, of what to expect and how to prepare for this mission,” he said. He said that he was carrying something from Sharma into space, but would not like to disclose that before the end of the mission. Shukla said the Axiom 4 mission was extremely important for India and had come at just the right time. There could be several learnings from this mission that could be incorporated into the Gaganyaan programme, he said. The mission will take all four astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS) for a duration of 14 days, longer than Sharma’s 7 days, 21 hours, and 40 minutes in space. The mission is likely to be launched in the spring of 2025, according to NASA. The mission will use SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft. The astronauts underwent training at the European Space Agency (ESA), Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), and Japan Manned Space Systems Corporation (JAMSS). The initial training was carried out at ESA’s European Astronaut Centre in Cologne, Germany. There the astronauts learned about the communication systems, emergency response procedures and conducting research activities inside the Columbus module of the ISS. Columbus is a European module of ISS that has a versatile laboratory for interdisciplinary research in microgravity. India’s space agency along with the department of biotechnology have been working on developing space biology experiments that may be carried out on-board Axiom-4. Afterwards, the crew underwent training at JAXA's Tsukuba Space Center in Japan, where they were trained on operations of the Japanese Experiment Module Kibo. The training included in-depth knowledge about the module’s capability. A mission patch for the astronaut uniform has also been developed, which shows the Earth in the centre of a pentagon, with the names and flags of all four astronauts. There are also seven stars depicted in the centre representing the seven continents. The first private mission to ISS by Axiom space was carried out in April 2022, with a second mission in August the same year. The third mission was launched in May 2023, which included the first woman to command a commercial human spaceflight mission and the first Saudi astronaut to live and work on the ISS.
