Poland, with the participation of the European Space Agency, has signed an agreement with Axiom Space, which organizes commercial flights into space. In accordance with it, a representative of the country will have the opportunity to visit the ISS and conduct research there.
Polish astronaut to fly into space
Axiom Space is known for organizing flights of fully commercial crews into space on SpaceX Dragon spacecraft. On August 9, its representatives announced that, through the mediation of the European Space Agency (ESA), they had concluded an agreement with the Polish government to provide an opportunity to send their astronaut to the ISS. Later, this news was confirmed by the country’s officials.
“Cooperation with ESA and Axiom Space is an important step in the development of both the Polish space sector and science,” said Waldemar Buda, Minister of Economic Development and Technology of Poland. A Polish astronaut will have the opportunity to test the most advanced Polish technologies”.
Also on June 29, at a briefing of the ESA council, it became known that Poland had increased the size of its participation in the organization by $ 320 million (which includes the flight of an astronaut), although there were no details about it at that time.
And now it has become known that he will fly during one of the next ESA missions, although nothing else is known about it. However, most likely, it will be Sławosz Uznański, who was recently selected by ESA as a reserve astronaut. Until now, it was assumed that he would not have a permanent place in the organization’s team, but would be able to take part in individual flights.
Other European astronauts
Interestingly, Poland has already become the second country that, with the participation of ESA, has agreed with Axiom Space. Sweden was the first. Its representative Marcus Wandt is also a reserve astronaut of the European Space Agency.
His flight to the ISS was announced in April this year. Wandt is expected to take part in the Ax-3 mission, which is scheduled to launch in early 2024. However, only Sweden and Poland do not exhaust the interest of European states in space flights.
Walter Villadei, an Italian Air Force pilot who participated in Virgin Galactic’s first commercial flight on its suborbital shuttle and was a reserve member of the Ax-2 expedition, says he is ready for a real space flight.
In addition, Hungary announced an increase of USD 100 million in its space program. And it also wants to use this money to organize the flight of its astronaut as part of a private mission. However, so far neither Italy nor Hungary have applied to ESA with such a request.
However, their proposals are eagerly awaited there. The agency wants as many countries as possible to be interested in manned flights. After all, thanks to this, in the future it is possible to move to developing your own ship.
According to spacenews.com.
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