A capsule carrying a crew with Türkiye's first astronaut and three other members splashed down off the coast of Florida on Friday, completing a return to Earth after a nearly three-week stay at the International Space Station (ISS).
Türkiye celebrated Alper Gezeravcı's launch from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Jan. 19 on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. A former fighter pilot and captain for Turkish Airlines, he became the first person from his country to fly to space.
Gezeravcı was joined on the trip by Italian Air Force Col. Walter Villadei, Sweden's Marcus Wandt, a former fighter pilot chosen as a reserve astronaut by the European Space Agency (ESA) in 2022, and Michael Lopez-Alegria, their escort.
Lopez-Alegria is a Spanish and U.S. citizen and a retired NASA astronaut who now works for Axiom Space, the Houston company that arranged the chartered flight.
The Axiom Mission 3 (Ax-3) crew returned in a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft that parachuted into the Atlantic off the Florida coast, where it was intercepted and brought aboard a recovery boat.
Before leaving the space station, Gezeravcı thanked his country for its "bold and determined decision" to send a citizen into space as part of its 100th anniversary as a republic.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Friday said Türkiye plans to send many more people to space.
"Our astronaut Gezeravci has landed. Hopefully, as Türkiye, we will send many more Alper Gezeravcıs to space," Erdoğan told a gathering in the southern province of Antalya.
After initial safety checks by SpaceX staff, the Dragon capsule was lifted onto a recovery vessel and its crew disembarked from the spacecraft.
On the ship, crew members took their first steps after roughly three weeks in non-gravity conditions.
The crew will travel to Houston, Texas, where they will remain under observation for a week to complete the adaptation process.
While in orbit, the astronauts conducted about 30 science experiments, learning more about the impact of microgravity on the human body, advancing industrial processes, and more. They also chatted with schoolchildren and officials from their countries.
About half of the experiments were conducted by Gezeravcı alone.
The mission was initially meant to last two weeks, but the return journey was delayed by several days owing to bad weather, resulting in an 18-day stay on the ISS.
The capsule undocked from the International Space Station on Wednesday and began its return to Earth.
"I am very proud of my Ax-3 crewmates who helped their agencies achieve all of their science objectives, technology demonstrations and outreach events," Lopez-Alegria said in a farewell ceremony before the crew headed back to Earth.
The trip back took the crew around 47 hours.
The Ax-3 was Axiom's third private mission to the space station; the fourth is planned for later this year.
And it celebrated many firsts.
It was the first commercial spaceflight mission comprised of government and ESA-sponsored national astronauts. In addition to Gezeravcı becoming the first-ever Turkish astronaut, Wandt was the first ESA project astronaut to fly on a commercial space mission.
“The successful return of our Ax-3 astronauts signifies more than just the completion of a human spaceflight mission; it marks a pivotal moment in commercial space exploration and a significant milestone for Europe’s pursuits in low-Earth orbit,” said Axiom Space CEO Michael Suffredini.
“Axiom Space’s first three commercial missions to the ISS are a testament to international advancement in space, with diverse crews representing eight nations, as well as – for the first time on Ax-3 – the European Space Agency. The success of these missions is an important step along our journey toward Axiom Station, underscoring our continuous efforts to expand access to low-Earth orbit.”
Axiom Space was founded in 2016 by Michael Suffredini, a former ISS program manager for NASA, and entrepreneur Kam Ghaffarian.
In addition to organizing private missions to the orbital outpost, the company is developing spacesuits for future NASA missions to the Moon.
It is also building a commercial space station that it intends to initially attach to the ISS, then separate and orbit independently sometime before the ISS is retired.
