Montreal businessman among private crew to visit space station
Two are grandfathers, the other is a Canadian with three young children. All three are extremely wealthy, with the means to pay the $55-million price for a trip to the International Space Station. They are the first would-be spaceflight crew comprised entirely of private citizens in a mission to the station.
Sometime early next year, if all goes according to plan, the trio — Mark Pathy, the chief executive of Mavrik Corp., a Montreal investment firm; Larry Connor, the managing partner of the Connor Group, a real estate investment firm based in Ohio; and Eytan Stibbe, a businessman and former Israeli Air Force fighter pilot — will lift off from the Kennedy Space Center aboard a Spacex dragon spacecraft for an eight-day stay on the International Space Station.
Accompanying them will be Michael López-alegría, a former NASA astronaut who flew to space four times and is now a vice president of Axiom Space, the houston-based company that is coordinating their trip to space. López-alegría is overseeing their training and will serve as the mission’s commander.
If it takes place as envisioned, the flight would mark a watershed moment in human space flight, one that, according to Axiom, which announced the identities of the three paying passengers on Tuesday, will eventually make space more accessible and further erode the monopoly that governments have long held on space travel. The company is planning two flights per year and also is developing a space station of its own that NASA hopes may one day replace the International Space Station, the orbiting lab that has been in space for 22 years.
Several wealthy private citizens have flown to the space station before — but on the russian Soyuz craft because NASA forbade the practice. In 2019, NASA reversed its stance, saying the missions would help boost a growing commercial space industry as well as help NASA’S bottom line. The space agency charges $35,000 a day per passenger for food, storage and communication during stays on board the orbiting laboratory — a total of $840,000 for three people for eight days.
“But it won’t come with any hilton or Marriott points,” Jeff dewit, NASA’S former chief financial officer, said at the 2019 announcement of the policy change.
Pathy, who has three young children, has a lifelong passion for space but didn’t think he would ever be able to go until a friend told him about the Axiom missions. his initial reaction was skeptical.
“I wasn’t sure it was completely real, and I’d never heard of this company, Axiom,” he said. “I obviously was not going to blast off in a rocket if this was some sort of Mickey Mouse travel outfit. But the more I inquired and the more I spoke with them directly, the more I realized they were the real deal. It was really possible. And that moment where you think, ‘holy cow, this is something I could actually do,’ it’s a bit of a surreal moment.”
Flying private citizens to space is a goal that NASA has had for years. At the beginning of the space shuttle program, it envisioned offering seats to private citizens and started a “Spaceflight Participant” program. A couple of members of Congress flew first, but then NASA selected a teacher — Christa Mcauliffe.
The program ended after the space shuttle Challenger exploded shortly after takeoff, killing Mcauliffe and the other astronauts. The agency decided space flight was too risky for ordinary citizens.
In interviews with The Post, the crew of the Axiom flight said they were well aware of the risks. Within the ranks of the professional astronaut corps, there may very well be skepticism, if not outright objection, so their goal is to prove their merit through conviction and a humble dedication.
“There will definitely be some resistance,” said López-alegría, who spent 20 years as a NASA astronaut and holds the record for the most spacewalks. “I think it’s our job to win them over. We can do that certainly by being as prepared and expert as possible. And so, my goal is to get those guys to the point where no stone is unturned. And when they get on board station, the crews are pleased, maybe pleasantly.”
The men embrace the challenge wide-eyed, they said, chastened by past disasters, aware of the risks, but bullish on the benefits. They are aware, too, that there are problems on Earth that need to be addressed and that space flight is viewed by much of the public as a superfluous indulgence, especially during a pandemic and an economic crisis. The crew members say they see the flight as an enhancement of their other philanthropic efforts.
Pathy is working with the Canadian Space Agency and the Montreal Children’s hospital on health-related research projects. And Stibbe plans to conduct scientific research coordinated by the ramon Foundation and the Israeli Space Agency.
Pathy and Connor travelled to Cape Canaveral last year to witness Spacex’s first launch of astronauts. It was the first time either of them had been to a rocket launch, and both said they were awestruck.