WASHINGTON — Commercial space station developer Vast has reached an agreement with the French government to fly two French astronauts on its missions, including the first flight to its Haven-1 space station.
Vast announced June 1 an agreement to fly a French astronaut on the company’s first private astronaut mission to the International Space Station and another on the first flight to Haven-1. Both missions, using SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft, are scheduled for 2027 and will each last about two weeks.
“This agreement reinforces Vast’s commitment to launch and operate the world’s first commercial space station,” Max Haot, chief executive of Vast, said in a statement. “We are honored that France selected Vast for these historic missions.”
Vast said that veteran European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Pesquet will fly on, and command, the company’s ISS mission. Pesquet flew two long-duration missions to the station in 2016 and 2021.
Pesquet will be able to command a private astronaut mission to the ISS thanks to changes in NASA rules. The agency had required that such missions be commanded by a former NASA astronaut with flight experience. However, in the most recent solicitation in 2025, NASA allowed companies to propose alternative commanders from Canada, Europe or Japan with similar spaceflight experience.
Flying on Haven-1 will be Arnaud Prost, an ESA reserve astronaut selected in the agency’s 2022 class. Reserve astronauts are trained to fly short-term missions without becoming full-time members of ESA’s astronaut corps. Two reserve astronauts, Sweden’s Marcus Wandt and Poland’s Sławosz Uznański-Wiśniewski, flew on Axiom Space’s Ax-3 and Ax-4 private astronaut missions, respectively.
Vast has not announced any other crew members for either mission. The company said those people will include “professional astronauts from sovereign countries with diplomatic ties to France.” The crew selected for the ISS mission will have to be approved by a multilateral board composed of representatives of the ISS partners.
The missions will also conduct science experiments, technology demonstrations and outreach activities in cooperation with French companies and academic institutions. In the announcement, Vast said the French government will provide more details at an event called the International Space Summit that will take place in Paris in September.
The deal was announced at the Choose France Summit, an event organized by French President Emmanuel Macron to highlight foreign investment in the country. Vast also said it would establish its European headquarters in Paris.
The announcement highlights the importance of what are known in the industry as sovereign astronauts, or those representing national governments, to the business cases of commercial space stations. At the Space Symposium in April, executives said they saw strong interest from countries that want to fly their astronauts on private astronaut missions or on commercial stations.
