The next private company to send a crew to the ISS

If you've been following the space news to any degree, it's probably not going to surprise you to read that California startup, Vast, will be the next company to send a crew of four up to the International Space Station. 

NASA announced on Thursday (Feb. 12) that it has picked Long Beach-based Vast to conduct the sixth private astronaut flight to the International Space Station (ISS), which will launch no earlier than summer 2027.

The selection is a big deal for Vast and for NASA, which wants private companies to take the reins from the ISS when it's decommissioned in 2030.

There have been four other private astronaut crews to visit the ISS and all have been from Houston-based Axiom space. Axiom is also scheduled for a fifth mission to the ISS, currently scheduled for No Earlier Than (NET) January 2027. Axiom's missions have all been flown on SpaceX hardware; Crew Dragon capsules lifted by Falcon 9 boosters. Vast's mission will fly the same hardware, which has got to be good training. We don't know who will be flying for Vast; they have to choose a crew and get them approved by NASA before they'll be named. 

Flying the same missions isn't the only similarity between Axiom and Vast.

Vast and Axiom have similar long-term ambitions: Both companies aim to establish and operate a private space station in low Earth orbit (LEO), and both see organizing tourist flights to the ISS as a step toward achieving that goal.

"Leveraging the remaining life of the space station with science and research-led commercial crewed missions is a critical part of the transition to commercial space stations and fully unlocking the orbital economy," Vast CEO Max Haot said in the same statement.

I'm sure it's purely coincidental that NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman says similar things. 

"Private astronaut missions represent more than access to the International Space Station — they create opportunities for new ideas, companies and capabilities that further enhance American leadership in low Earth orbit and open doors for what’s next," NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said in a statement on Thursday.

"We're proud to welcome Vast to this growing community of commercial partners," he added. "Each new entrant brings unique strengths that fuel a dynamic, innovative marketplace as we advance research and technology and prepare for missions to the moon, Mars and beyond."

When we talk about Vast and Axiom working on private space stations, don't forget that's just part of the bigger effort to build private space stations. Blue Origin and Sierra Space are working on a station they call Orbital Reef, and a handful of others including NanoRacks and Voyager Space are developing another station named Starlab.

With the ISS having been on orbit and continuously occupied since 2000, it's probably easy to think it'll always be there. Reality is that it's dependent on the continuous stream of supplies from the ground, so it's not hard to think of things that could render it impossible to maintain and a future (or just a future period) without a space station. 

The Zvezda service module, seen here near the top of this image, is talked about as the module that made the International Space Station habitable, opening the life of the ISS. Image Credit: NASA