By Steve Nesius, Joey Roulette and Steve Gorman CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) -NASA retiree turned private astronaut Peggy Whitson was launched on the fifth flight to orbit of her career early on Wednesday,

The mission will be commanded by Peggy Whitson, former NASA astronaut and director of human spaceflight at Axiom Space. Grp Cpt Shukla will serve as the pilot. The two mission specialists are ESA (European Space Agency) project astronaut Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski of Poland, and HUNOR (Hungarian to Orbit) astronaut Tibor Kapu of Hungary.

NASA said Thursday that it wants to monitor the cabin pressure on the Russian side of the orbiting lab before accepting visitors.