The first private mission to the International Space Station took off

Three businessmen and a former NASA astronaut embarked on the first fully personal mission to the International Space Station aboard the SpaceX rocket on Friday, April 8, where they will stay for more than a week.

The liftoff took place at 11:17 a.m. (3:17 pm GMT) local time from the Kennedy Space Center under the blue sky in Cape Canaveral, Florida.

Newcomers have already visited the International Space Station (ISS), especially in the 2000s, last year when Russia sent a crew there, followed by Japanese billionaires. But these were flown with astronauts on Soyuz rockets.

This time, Axiom Space, which co-organized the trip with SpaceX and NASA, paid to use its station. The commander of the mission, dubbed the Ax-1, is US-Spanish Michael Lopez-Alegrea, a former astronaut of the US space agency who has already visited the ISS.

The other three team members paid $ 10 million each for the test. The pilot’s role is occupied by American Larry Connor, who heads a real estate company.

Also on the board: Mark Fathy, a Canadian, is the owner of an investment firm and former pilot Aidan Stebe, co – founder of the Investment Fund. He is the second Israeli astronaut in history to return from the ISS after Ilan Ramon, who died in the 2003 US space shuttle Columbia explosion.