The Crew Dragon Freedom shuttle has returned to Earth with the four crew members of the second private mission of Axiom Space, the Ax-2. Approximately 12 hours after detachment from the International Space Station, the shuttle ditched as scheduled at 5:04 am Italian time, in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, carrying Commander Peggy Whitson, pilot John Shoffner and mission specialists Ali Alqarni and Rayyanah Barnawi, protagonists of a space adventure that lasted a total of 10 days.
“SpaceX, we would like to tell you, it was a phenomenal journey,” said commander Peggy Whitson, a former NASA astronaut and space veteran with four flights under her belt, after the splashdown. “We really liked everything.”
Ax-2 was the second mission to the ISS managed by Axiom Space (after the Ax-1 pioneer mission in April 2022) and the first involving both government and private astronauts, with the aim of making space accessible to a ever-increasing proportion of the population.
Source: Ansa
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