International Space Station welcomes its first astronauts from India, Poland and Hungary
Jun 26, 2025, 3:34 AM | Updated: 7:52 am
SpaceX Falcon 9 crew, Shubhanshu Shukla of the Indian Space Research Organization, from left, Tibor Kapu of Hungary, commander Peggy Whitson, and Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski of Poland, pose for a photo before departing for a launch to the International Space Station at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., Tuesday, June 24, 2025. (AP Photo/Terry Renna)
Credit: ASSOCIATED PRESS
(AP Photo/Terry Renna)
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — The first astronauts in more than 40 years from India, Poland and Hungary arrived at the International Space Station on Thursday, ferried there by SpaceX on a private flight.
The crew of four will spend two weeks at the orbiting lab, performing dozens of experiments. They launched Wednesday from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.
America’s most experienced astronaut, Peggy Whitson, is the commander of the visiting crew. She works for Axiom Space, the Houston company that arranged the chartered flight.
Besides Whitson, the crew includes India’s Shubhanshu Shukla, a pilot in the Indian Air Force; Hungary’s Tibor Kapu, a mechanical engineer; and Poland’s Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski, a radiation expert and one of the European Space Agency’s project astronauts on temporary flight duty.
No one has ever visited the International Space Station from those countries before. In fact, the last time anyone rocketed into orbit from those countries was in the late 1970s and 1980s, traveling with the Soviets.
It’s the fourth Axiom-sponsored flight to the space station since 2022. The company is one of several that are developing their own space stations due to launch in the coming years.
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