NASA crew to make rare early return to Earth after medical issue in space

Four astronauts will return from the International Space Station more than a month ahead of schedule after an unnamed crew member experienced a medical issue.

NASA has not provided details about the nature of the problem, citing privacy concerns. The agency typically does not discuss the specifics of health matters related to astronauts.

The affected crew member is in stable condition, NASA previously confirmed, and is not expected to receive special treatment during the return trip, said Dr. James Polk, NASA’s chief health and medical officer at the agency’s headquarters. The astronaut would also be best served by being evaluated on the ground, Polk added.

“We have a very robust suite of medical hardware on board the International Space Station,” Polk noted during a Thursday news conference. “But we don’t have the complete amount of hardware that I would have in the emergency department, for example, to complete a workup of a patient.

“And in this particular incident,” he added, “we would like to complete that work up, and the best way to complete that workup is on the ground.”

The returning group, which includes American astronauts Mike Fincke and Zena Cardman, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Kimiya Yui, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Platonov, makes up NASA’s SpaceX Crew-11. The mission, part of the orbiting laboratory’s regular staffing rotation, was expected to conclude no earlier than next month. Typically, NASA wouldn’t bring a team such as this back to Earth before another was in place.

NASA’s newly appointed administrator, Jared Isaacman — who has twice flown to orbit on private SpaceX missions — said he made the call to bring the group of four astronauts home.

Isaacman said during a news briefing Thursday that his decision was informed by the fact that four crew members are slated to launch to the space station on NASA’s Crew-12 mission in the coming weeks, and the agency is assessing ways to expedite that launch. The mission had been slated to take off around mid-February.

The Crew-11 team will depart the space station within “days,” Isaacman said.

Delayed spacewalk

NASA revealed the astronaut’s medical concern on Wednesday when it announced that the agency was opting to postpone a spacewalk, citing the undisclosed “medical concern.”

“These are the situations NASA and our partners train for and prepare to execute safely,” NASA noted in a statement.

When the Crew-11 astronauts return, it will leave only one NASA astronaut on board the football-field-size orbiting laboratory: Chris Williams, who arrived at the space station in late November on board a Russian Soyuz capsule as part of a ride-sharing agreement between the US and Russia.

Officials on Thursday said Williams is well prepared to handle any tasks that come his way, and they are confident he will be joined shortly by the Crew-12 astronauts to return staffing to normal levels.

“This is one of the reasons why we fly mixed crews on Soyuz and US vehicles — because we want to make sure we have operators for both (the US and Russian) segments” of the space station, said Amit Kshatriya, NASA’s associate administrator.

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