[imagesource: Twitter / Axiom Space]

The International Space Station just became a lot more crowded.

The size of an average American five-bedroom home, the space station was designed to support a crew of six, according to NASA, but is now home to 11 astronauts.

That’s because four commercial astronauts – part of the Axiom-1 (Ax-1) space mission – finally made it on board.

These space tourists arrived at the space station on April 9 after spending close to a day travelling from the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida, reported Mashable:

While the ISS was flying 250 miles smack-dab above the Atlantic Ocean, private astronauts Michael Lopez-Alegria, Larry Connor, Eytan Stibbe, and Mark Pathy successfully docked the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft and opened the hatch at 10:13 a.m. ET.

Check them out:

The four commercial Ax-1 astronauts have floated into the International Space Station.

Israeli investor Eytan Stibbe was first, followed by Canadian entrepreneur Mark Pathy, American businessman Larry Connor & retired NASA astronaut Mike López-Alegría.https://t.co/ahuzXRfiev pic.twitter.com/FkDHZE0tfo

— Spaceflight Now (@SpaceflightNow) April 9, 2022

More from the cramped moments of arrival:

#Ax1 crew welcomed by the @space_station crews as they leave Dragon and enter into their home for the next 8 days pic.twitter.com/ewgYizC2Kv

— Axiom Space (@Axiom_Space) April 9, 2022

Everybody together now:

Four #Ax1 astronauts from @Axiom_Space opened the @SpaceX Dragon Endeavour hatch today at 10:13am ET, entered the station, and met the seven-member Exp 67 crew. https://t.co/Qj9EA0wf0x

— International Space Station (@Space_Station) April 9, 2022

As the first-ever commercial mission to the space station, Axiom astronauts paid some good money to spend 10 days aboard conducting various scientific experiments.

They will have full access to the microgravity environment in the lab and be able to take part in a number of other commercial activities.

Republic World noted that Lopez-Alegria, a former NASA astronaut and Axiom Vice President, is the only non-paying customer of the Ax-1 mission.

The other three members have had to fork out a whopping $55 million (around R800 million) each.

As a result, the Axiom mission could make history by adding a new definition to what constitutes an “astronaut”:

For decades, that title was reserved for government space pilots and crew. More recently, uber-rich space tourists riding the likes of Blue Origin, SpaceX, and Virgin Galactic have received the distinction of breaching Earth’s atmosphere.

With this new voyage comes a third possible description: Someone privately trained and launched into space to perform commercial scientific research.

Larry Connor, the mission’s pilot, stipulated the difference between space tourists and private astronauts during a news conference a week ago:

“Our feeling is with the space tourists, they’ll spend 10 or 15 hours training for five to 10 minutes in space — and by the way, that’s fine. In our case, depending upon our role, we’ve spent anywhere from 750 to over 1,000 hours training.”

Lopez-Alegria isn’t so sure “space tourism” is a suitable description, though, based on the “what the private astronauts will accomplish”.

Either way, everyone has been reduced to an awestruck tourist upon seeing the view of tiny Earth.

[sources:mashable&republicworld]