Ax-3 Mission set for lift-off on Thursday.
Rome astronaut Walter Villadei will function pilot on the Axiom Mission 3 (Ax-3), a non-public spaceflight to the Worldwide House Station (ISS) set to launch on Thursday.
Villadei, 49, might be a part of the four-person crew on the mission together with Spanish commander Michael López-Alegría, Turkey’s first astronaut Alper Gezeravcı, and Sweden’s Marcus Wandt.
The flight is scheduled for lift-off at 22.49, Italian time, from the NASA’s Kennedy House Heart at Cape Canaveral in Florida.
Ax-3 had been scheduled to take off on Wednesday however was delayed by 24 hours to permit for added pre-launch checks.
SpaceX and Ax-3 accomplished a full rehearsal of launch day actions pic.twitter.com/2tXkfUzmQJ— SpaceX (@SpaceX) January 16, 2024
The 2-week mission might be operated by Axiom House, a non-public Houston-based firm which might be conducting its third flight beneath a partnership with NASA.
Throughout their time aboard the ISS, the crew will perform roughly 30 experiments.
In an interview with Corriere della Sera newspaper on Wednesday, Villadei stated he was honoured to hitch the mission which he described as “a rare alternative to have fun the 100 years of the Italian Air Power, and in addition the sixtieth anniversary of the launch of the San Marco 1, which in 1964 made Italy the third nation on the earth to ship its personal satellite tv for pc into orbit.”
Who’s Walter Villadei?
Born in Rome in 1974, Walter Villadei serves as a colonel within the Italian Air Power (ItAF) and is presently head of the ItAF consultant workplace within the US, overseeing industrial spaceflight initiatives.
Villadei acquired cosmonaut coaching in Star Metropolis, Russia, and has intensive expertise in Italian house programmes, together with quite a few assignments as a member of the scientific committee of the Italian House Company and nationwide consultant for the European Fee for the House Surveillance and Monitoring Program.
In June 2023 he flew on a sub-orbital flight to house with Virgin Galactic the place he served as VIRTUTE-1 mission commander.
