NASA has confirmed a new launch date for Indian astronaut Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla’s historic flight to the International Space Station (ISS). The mission, delayed multiple times, is now scheduled for lift-off at 2:31 a.m. EDT (12:01 p.m. IST) on Wednesday, June 25 from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Shukla is part of Axiom Mission 4, a private astronaut mission by NASA, Axiom Space, and SpaceX. He will travel aboard a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft launched on a Falcon 9 rocket. The mission marks a major milestone as Shukla is set to become the first Indian astronaut to visit the ISS and only the second Indian in space after Rakesh Sharma in 1984.

NASA stated that docking with the ISS is targeted for approximately 7:00 a.m. EDT on Thursday, June 26.

Shukla will serve as the pilot of the mission alongside veteran astronaut Peggy Whitson, the mission commander from the US. Also onboard are mission specialists Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski of Poland and Tibor Kapu of Hungary.

While on the ISS, Shukla will conduct pioneering research on space nutrition, focusing on edible microalgae. The experiment, developed through a collaboration between ISRO, the Department of Biotechnology (DBT), and NASA, aims to better understand sustainable life-support systems for long-duration space missions.

The study will evaluate how microgravity and radiation affect nutrient-rich microalgae by comparing key growth and metabolic markers between space and Earth environments.