On board, among others, was the Dutch-Israeli entrepreneur and pilot Eytan Stibbe, who reportedly paid several tens of millions of euros for the trip to space company Axiom Space. The crew also included Spanish-American astronaut Michael López-Alegría, American entrepreneur Larry Connor and Canadian investor Mark Pathy.
The so-called Axiom Space Mission 1 was launched on April 8 from Cape Canaveral space base in Florida. A day later, the rocket arrived at the space station with the space tourists. It was the first fully commercial astronaut flight to the ISS.