Indian astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla is likely to fly to the International Space Station (ISS) as soon as May this year, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) said in an update about Axiom Mission 4 (Ax-4).

Group Captain Shukla will serve as the astronaut designate and Mission Pilot.

Mr Shukla, currently serving as an officer in the Indian Air Force, will become the second Indian to travel to space, four decades after Wing Commander Rakesh Sharma’s historic feat in 1984. He will be accompanied by Peggy Whitson, a former NASA astronaut and mission commander; Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski from Poland; and Tibor Kapu from Hungary.

His selection comes after ISRO identified him as a key astronaut for India’s upcoming Gaganyaan mission, India’s first human spaceflight program, aiming to send a three-member crew to a 400 km low Earth orbit for a three-day mission. ISRO has collaborated with NASA and Axiom Space for this mission.

India has also chosen Group Captain Prasanth Balakrishnan Nair as a designated astronaut who will become part of Ax-4 should Mr Shukla be unable to fly.

As part of an agreement between NASA and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), India bought a seat for its astronaut on the upcoming mission to space by Axiom Space Inc, a Houston-based company.

Ax-4, the fourth private astronaut mission to the ISS, is targeted to launch from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. It will launch aboard a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft hoisted by the Falcon-9 rocket, which will fly them to the space station. Once docked, the astronauts are scheduled to spend up to 14 days aboard the orbiting laboratory, conducting a mission comprised of science, outreach and commercial activities. The private mission also carries the first astronauts from Poland and Hungary to stay aboard the space station.

According to NASA, the first private astronaut mission to the station Axiom Mission 1 lifted off in April 2022 for a 17-day mission aboard the orbiting laboratory. The second private astronaut mission to the station Axiom Mission 2 launched in May 2023 with four private astronauts who spent eight days in orbit. The most recent private astronaut mission Axiom Mission 3 launched in January 2024, with the crew spending 18 days at the space station.

Ax-4’s likely launch in May will come months after Indian-origin NASA astronaut Sunita Williams returned to Earth after spending 286 days in space.