New Delhi [India], June 30 (ANI): Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla, who is part of a four-member crew of Axiom Space's Ax4 mission, will be interacting with the UR Rao Satellite Centre (URSC) in Karnataka through a ham radio conversation from the International Space Station (ISS) on July 4.

In a post on X on Monday, the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) announced the upcoming contact with Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla, with the callsign VU2TNI, scheduled for Friday, July 4 at 10:17 UTC (3:47 PM IST), via the K6DUE telebridge.

'Contact upcoming with India! Axiom Space's Ax4 crew member Shubhanshu Shukla, VU2TNI, will talk to the UR Rao Satellite Centre (URSC) in Karnataka via ham radio from the Space Station,' the ARISS posted.

'Scheduled Fri. July 4 at 10:17 UTC | 6:17 AM ET | 3:47 PM ISS via K6DUE telebridge,' the post added.

https://x.com/ARISS_Intl/status/1939672805005496785

This interaction marks a significant moment in India's space journey, as Group Captain Shukla, the second Indian to travel to space after Rakesh Sharma, continues to represent the nation aboard the ISS as the first Indian at the space station.

Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla, part of Axiom Mission 4, launched on June 25 from NASA's Kennedy Space Centre in Florida at 3:21 am ET on Wednesday, aboard SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket.

Group Captain Shukla is serving as Mission Pilot on the four-member Axiom Mission 4 and piloted the Dragon spacecraft, which successfully docked with the ISS on June 26, ahead of schedule, autonomously docking at 4:05 pm (IST) to the space-facing port of the space station's Harmony module.

The Ax-4 crew was welcomed by the seven-member Expedition 73 team at the ISS and took part in a safety briefing

Former NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation) astronaut Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla, ESA (European Space Agency) astronauts Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski of Poland and Tibor Kapu of Hungary are part of the crew for the Axiom 4 mission.

The Ax-4 crew is expected to stay aboard the space station for up to 14 days.

Earlier on Saturday, Group Captain Shukla said that India looks 'very big and grand' from Space.

'Jab pehli baar Bharat ko dekha, Bharat sach mein bohat bhavya dikta hain, jitna ham map pe dekhte hain, usse kahin jyada bada (When we saw India for the first time, we saw that India looks very grand, very big, much bigger than what we see on the map),' Group Captain Shukla said during his interaction with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. (ANI)