End of Axiom Space’s latest private mission to the ISS

The four crew members of Axiom Space’s recent private spaceflight have concluded their stay aboard the International Space Station (ISS). The Crew Dragon capsule, named Grace, undocked from the ISS early this morning, marking the final leg of the Ax-4 mission.

Undocking occurred at 7:15 a.m. EDT, with the spacecraft safely maneuvering away from the station. Grace performed deorbit burns and is now on a trajectory to re-enter Earth’s atmosphere, with plans to splash down in the Pacific Ocean near California around 5:30 a.m. EDT on July 15.

A white space capsule hangs upright, docked to the port of a space station. A robotic arm hangs to the left in the foreground. — The Crew Dragon vessel just before undocking from the ISS on July 14, 2025.

The mission was commanded by Peggy Whitson, a former NASA astronaut and now Axiom’s director of human spaceflight. She expressed gratitude to ground control and support crews as the spacecraft moved away from the station. Her crewmates included pilot Shubhanshu “Shux” Shukla and mission specialists Sławosz “Suave” Uznański-Wiśniewski and Tibor Kapu, each making their spaceflight debut. Notably, Whitson set a new record for American astronaut days in space, accumulating 695 days over her career.

The Ax-4 mission launched on June 26 aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 from Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Complex-39A. Over the course of the mission, the crew performed over 60 experiments and technology demonstrations involving contributions from 31 nations, advancing scientific understanding of microgravity environments.

Shubhanshu Shukla hails from the Indian Air Force and is preparing for India’s first crewed space mission, Gaganyaan. Suave is from the European Space Agency, and Tibor Kapu represents Hungary’s orbital astronaut program, HUNOR. Their participation marked historic firsts for their respective countries on a space station mission.

The crew’s departure procedures began early this morning, with hatch closure at 5:07 a.m. EDT. The Crew Dragon is now on a 22.5-hour reentry trajectory, with recovery planned in the Pacific Ocean—the second time SpaceX has recovered a crew capsule off the West Coast, following the Crew-9 mission in March. This change aims to reduce debris-related risks in reentry.