President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan held a meeting with the crew of the Axiom Mission 3 (Ax-3), which included Türkiye's first astronaut Alper Gezeravcı.

The meeting took place at the Presidential Complex in the capital Ankara.

Astronauts Col. Walter Villadei from Italy’s Air Force, Sweden's Marcus Wandt, a former fighter pilot chosen as a reserve astronaut by the European Space Agency (ESA) in 2022, and Michael Lopez-Alegria attended the meeting with Erdoğan, as well as Türkiye’s Industry and Technology Minister Mehmet Fatih Kacır.

No details were provided about the closed-door meeting.

In February, Axiom Mission 3 (Ax-3) crew returned in a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft that parachuted into the Atlantic off the Florida coast, where it was intercepted and brought aboard a recovery boat.

While in orbit, the astronauts conducted about 30 science experiments, learning more about the impact of microgravity on the human body, advancing industrial processes, and more. They also chatted with schoolchildren and officials from their countries.

About half of the experiments were conducted by Gezeravcı alone.

The mission was initially meant to last two weeks, but the return journey was delayed by several days owing to bad weather, resulting in an 18-day stay on the ISS.