UK Space Agency working on an all British mission to space with Axiom

The UK Space Agency and Axiom Space have signed a memorandum of understanding to perform a two week spaceflight with an all British crew in the future. No destination or crew have been announced just yet but the UK Space Agency is now working to design the mission around a core of scientific experiments.

Axiom to fly Britons on future missions

The UK Space Agency and Axiom Space will work together to perform an spaceflight with an all UK crew sometime in the future. This would be a big deal for the nation who hasn’t really had a large presence in human spaceflight. Although the country has played a big role in the European Space Agency for decades.

The mission will be designed to take funding from outside the UK Government so not to burden UK taxpayers, but the UKSA and ESA will be involved in training and astronaut selection. Axiom was already in talks with entities prior to the agreement but it now has the full support of the nation’s space agency.

The UK has a long history with its space program and supporting other space programs around the globe. It is one of a few nations to develop its own rocket to deploy satellites to space but cancel the program when it became successful.

While it has supported the ESA with funding for decades, it primarily funded uncrewed research endeavors. This is why the UK never had representation in ESA’s astronaut corp. That was until 2009 when the UK funded for one Army astronaut, Tim Peake, to join the corp and eventually fly to the ISS in 2015.

Before that, any Britons that wanted to fly to space had two options, become a US citizen and get in via NASA’s selection process or fly private (purchasing a seat on a Soyuz rocket). Six UK citizens flew to space in this way before Peake flew officially for the nation.

Axiom’s flight for UKSA doesn’t have any dates just yet for when it will take place. The flight also doesn’t have a destination. It could fly to the ISS but one issue would be finding an experienced enough UK astronaut to command the flight, a NASA requirement for ISS stays. The UK Axiom mission could also be a free flyer, spending two weeks inside the spacecraft conducting research and public outreach.

A third option depending on the timeline is flying to Axiom’s future space station. When attached to the ISS, it could feature a drop to NASA’s commander requirements.

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A system only available because of NASA’s gamble

Axiom is the only US provider of private missions to low Earth orbit and has exclusively done so on SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft. It’s business case is really only capable because NASA has invested so much into building the US’ commercial market so much.

SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft was developed for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program and received a portion of its funding by the agency. SpaceX began flying crews to the ISS in 2020 and currently is the only operation capsule from the US, Boeing is still working on flying its first crewed flight.

Axiom’s space station plan is also only possible thanks to NASA’s generosity. NASA is both allowing the company to attach its first few modules to the ISS for power and life support before detaching and becoming its own free floating station. Some funding has also been given to Axiom from NASA in hope it can replace the ISS in the near future.

NASA took a bet on a new way of how it completes its missions and it has paid off. That gamble didn’t just payoff for itself but for the world as nations no longer need to develop its own crewed launch system to reach space.