Rome astronaut Walter Villadei will serve as pilot on the Axiom Mission 3 (Ax-3), a private spaceflight to the International Space Station (ISS) set to launch on Thursday. Villadei, 49, will be part of the four-person crew on the mission along with Spanish commander Michael López-Alegría, Turkey's first astronaut Alper Gezeravcı, and Sweden's Marcus Wandt.

The flight is scheduled for lift-off at 22.49, Italian time, from the NASA's Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral in Florida. Ax-3 had been scheduled to take off on Wednesday but was delayed by 24 hours to allow for additional pre-launch checks.