From The ISS To IWC: Astronaunt Drew Feustel On Spaceflight’s Commercial Horizon

When Dr Andrew “Drew” Feustel talks about time, he doesn’t mean it philosophically – he means it could kill you.

“If you are not on time and if you don’t precisely burn the engines’ propulsion system on a rocket to come home, you will die,” he says flatly. “It’s literally life and death at all times. So it is super critical. If they tell you that the burn is four minutes and 28 seconds, if you burn for four minutes and 24 seconds, you’re probably not going to make it back to Earth. If you burn for four minutes and 35 seconds, you’ll also not make it back to Earth. It’s that critical. I mean, it is literally to the second.”

For a man who’s spent more than 60 hours spacewalking, repaired the Hubble Space Telescope, and logged millions of kilometres at 27,000 kilometres an hour, precision is as valuable as oxygen. And it’s precisely that instinct for engineering and reliability that now links Feustel with Vast – a company building the world’s first commercial space station – and IWC Schaffhausen, the renowned Swiss watchmaker whose obsession with tolerances and materials has made it a benchmark of breaking new ground in its own field.

Vast: The First Commercial Space Station

Founded in 2021, Vast is the new kid on the launchpad: a fast-scaling Californian manufacturer designing modular orbital habitats to succeed the ageing International Space Station.

“Vast’s mission is to be the first commercial space station platform,” Feustel, the company’s Lead Astronaut, explains. “There’s never been a commercial space station platform in the past – that’s always been property of sovereign nations, or a bunch of nations. NASA has had a mandate for the last decade to ‘enable a low-Earth-orbit economy,’ and that means commercialising the platform.”

It’s pragmatic, forward-thinking from a man who’s been deeply embedded in the traditional world of NASA for the best part of his career. Now, NASA wants to redirect its workforce toward the Moon and Mars, leaving low-Earth orbit, where Feustal spent his time aboard STS-125, STS-134, and six months living on the ISS for Expedition 55/56, to private operators. “Private companies will take over, if they aren’t already – they provide a service to the government, other nations and individuals as well who are interested in buying space,” he says.

But Feustel’s not selling joyrides. “I think it’s accurate to say that space tourism isn’t an objective of commercial space stations like Vast,” he says. “It’s more accurate to say there are private individuals and organisations that want to send humans to space independent of their countries… to do meaningful science in space. I think we are a long way from tourism and hotels in space, but you can definitely envision a world where someday that will be an opportunity.”

For now, Vast’s focus is Haven-1 – its first orbital outpost scheduled for launch in 2026 – and a future where research, industry, and exploration live side by side above the clouds. The Haven-1 module will hitch a ride aboard a SpaceX delivery rocket and have an initial three-year lifespan. Each module can be attached or detached from other modules to form a larger orbital living space in low-Earth orbit.

Living by the Clock

Feustel would see 16 sunrises and 16 sunsets every day up in space, yet his sense of time in orbit remained rigid. “On Earth, we wake and sleep by the sun. In space, that doesn’t happen. The sun’s really bright. Interestingly, your brain normalises that pretty quickly,” he says.

So astronauts live, quite literally, by the watch. “There’s a planner that astronauts have on orbit that we call ‘chasing the red line,’” he explains. “The red line is in the middle of the computer screen, and the time passes behind it. Usually, it’s based on Greenwich Mean Time. Your goal is not to live behind the line, but slightly in front of it or right at it. Because as you start to lose time and fall behind, you’re creating more work, less time for rest, less time for meals, less time to stay recharged and healthy in space. You have a mission, after all, and missions need a timeline. So time dictates everything for us in space.”

It’s a neat irony: in the most advanced environment humans have ever built, the most critical instrument is still a device invented hundreds of years ago. “You look at the first pictures of people in space – you see that most of the time there’s a watch hanging around their wrist,” Feustel says. “We all had ’em in space. They were standard issue. I basically had four watches hanging. Most were mine, one or two belonged to a friend, but they’re just in there with me at all times, so I knew where they were and I could make a choice of which ones any given day.”

Precision, Engineering, & Aesthetics

That lifelong dependency on precision has now evolved into collaboration. There’s a mutual belief between Vast and IWC that reliability, material innovation, and beauty all belong in the same orbit.

“I thought about that a little bit,” Feustel admits when asked which trait best defines the partnership. “I think the aesthetics of the watch and the brand are important. We’re talking about a commercial space station – that means commercialisation of the space station – so branding is important, and alignment on branding is as well.”

In 2023, aboard SpaceX’s Inspiration4 mission, four astronauts had a special IWC Pilot’s Watch Chronograph strapped to their space suits. This latest partnership with Vast will now go beyond a photo opportunity and see IWC actually testing materials and mechanisms in orbit – real R&D conducted hundreds of kilometres above the planet, where failure isn’t an option and every component is on the clock.

He continues: “The alignment of our new spacecraft with a storied company like IWC and their centuries of product innovation also elevates our brand, but it also elevates their brand. If your watch can work in space (actual space, not just inside a space station) and work well, that’s a cred not many have. There’s a reason companies have gained positive reputations by being in space. Spaceflight conditions are harsh. You can’t test for it on Earth in the design phases. It either works or it fails when you get up there. So I think we’re attempting to do the same thing: align ourselves with a well-engineered, quality product that will serve its purpose and work flawlessly in space – one less headache if everything works the way it’s supposed to.”

On The Horizon

The International Space Station is due for retirement in 2030. By then, Vast hopes to have a permanent foothold in orbit. “As the company finds opportunities and is successful, we can mature the business past low-Earth-orbit platforms – even into planetary habitats,” Feustel says. “Once you start going down that path with a company like Vast, the sky’s not the limit.”

As for returning himself? He smiles. “Of course I would. But we’ll do what’s right. We want to be successful – and that means making the right decisions for the mission.”

“Spaceflight is measured in time, not distance. Time will tell.”

More stratospheric milestones are on the horizon for IWC and Vast. Look out for some clarity on technical collaborations and space-going timepieces in mid-2026.

This article is presented in partnership with IWC Schaffhausen. Thank you for supporting the brands that support Boss Hunting.