Wing Commander Shubhanshu Shukla and Indian Air Force (IAF) officer has been selected as the pilot for Axiom Mission 4, scheduled for Spring 2025.
He will become the first Indian astronaut to travel to the International Space Station (ISS) on a private mission.
He was recently chosen as the ‘prime’ astronaut for the Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO) Gaganyaan mission.
Shubhanshu Shukla will serve as the pilot for Ax-4 mission.
The Ax-4 mission will be commanded by former NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, Axiom Space’s director of Human Spaceflight.
The two mission specialists are ESA project astronaut Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski from Poland and Tibor Kapu from Hungary.
The American space agency will launch the mission from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, using a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft, in the spring of 2025. It will last up to 14 days.
The crew will conduct scientific experiments, outreach programs, and commercial activities in microgravity as part of a collaborative mission between NASA and ISRO.
He graduated from the National Defence Academy (NDA) in 2005 and was commissioned into the fighter stream of the Indian Air Force in June 2006.
As a combat leader and seasoned test pilot, he boasts an impressive 2,000 hours of flight experience across various aircraft, including the Su-30 MKI, MiG-21, MiG-29, Jaguar, Hawk, Dornier, and An-32.
He was promoted to wing commander in June 2019 and selected for the IAF’s astronaut program through the Institute of Aerospace Medicine (IAM) in the same year.
In 2021, Shukla went to Russia to complete his basic training at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center. After his return, he continued his training at the Astronaut Training Facility in Bengaluru.
His ascent to the rank of group captain in March 2024 reflects his exceptional contributions.
On February 27, 2024, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced Shukla as one of the elite astronauts undergoing intensive training for India’s maiden human spaceflight mission, Gaganyaan, scheduled for launch in 2025.
In August 2024, Shukla was selected as the ‘prime’ astronaut for the upcoming Indo-US mission to the International Space Station (ISS).
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Notably, the Gaganyaan project envisages the demonstration of human spaceflight capability by launching a crew of 3 members to an orbit of 400 km for a 3-day mission and bringing them back safely to earth by landing in Indian sea waters.
