Saudi Arabia buys pair of SpaceX astronaut seats from Axiom -sources

Saudi Arabia buys pair of SpaceX astronaut seats from Axiom -sources

PARIS - Saudi Arabia is planning to launch two astronauts to the International Space Station aboard a space capsule from Elon Musk's SpaceX, becoming the latest Gulf nation to strengthen ties with private U.S. space companies, according to three people familiar with the arrangement.

The sources, speaking anonymously to discuss the mission's crew before its formal announcement, said the deal was signed privately earlier this year with Houston's Axiom Space, which arranges and manages private missions to space on U.S. spacecraft for researchers and tourists.

Under the deal, two Saudi astronauts will ride SpaceX's Crew Dragon capsule to the space station for a roughly weeklong stay early next year, the sources said. The Saudis would be the first from their country to go into space aboard a private spacecraft.

Axiom had no immediate comment. Officials with the Saudi Space Commission, Riyadh's space agency founded in 2018, were not immediately available to comment.

Private U.S. companies have increasingly played a key role in sending astronauts to the space station as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the U.S. space agency now focusing heavily on returning humans to the moon, looks to commercialize the United States' decades-old human spaceflight presence in low-Earth orbit.

The deal would mark