NASA considers evacuating ailing crew member from International Space Station

Someone on the International Space Station suffered an unspecified “medical situation” Wednesday, prompting the postponement of a planned spacewalk and raising the possibility of an early return for a portion of the lab’s seven-person crew, NASA said in a statement.

NASA has never ordered a medical evacuation from space before, but the option has always been available at the International Space Station with lifeboats ready for activation.

The space agency announced the spacewalk postponement Wednesday afternoon due to a “medical concern” with a member of the space station’s crew. NASA officials declined to identify the crew member or release further details about their condition, citing medical privacy restrictions.

A late-night update

It is rare, but not unprecedented, for NASA to postpone a spacewalk because of a medical issue. It last happened in 2021, when an astronaut was unable to perform a spacewalk due to a pinched nerve. NASA initially said managers would reschedule Thursday’s planned excursion for another date.

But the situation on the ISS appeared more serious after a second statement was released by NASA late Wednesday night. NASA confirmed the medical issue involved a single crew member and said the person was stable. Then, NASA said managers were considering bringing home the ailing crew member on a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule.

The Dragon spacecraft docked at the ISS launched August 1 with NASA astronauts Zena Cardman and Mike Fincke, Japanese astronaut Kimiya Yui, and Russian cosmonaut Oleg Platonov. This mission, designated Crew-11, was slated to end with the crew’s undocking and return to Earth around February 20.

“Safely conducting our missions is our highest priority, and we are actively evaluating all options, including the possibility of an earlier end to Crew-11’s mission,” NASA said. “These are the situations NASA and our partners train for and prepare to execute safely. We will provide further updates within the next 24 hours.”

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NASA’s consideration of returning the Crew-11 mission to Earth early suggests the crew member suffering the medical issue is one of the four who launched on the Crew Dragon capsule in August.

Cardman, 38, and Fincke, 58, were preparing to suit up and head outside the space station for a planned six-and-a-half-hour spacewalk early Thursday to prepare for the arrival of a new set of roll-out solar arrays later this year. Yui, 55, was assigned to help Cardman and Fincke put on their spacesuits ahead of the excursion. Platonov, a 39-year-old spaceflight rookie from Russia, rounds out the Crew-11 team.

Yui radioed mission control in Houston on Wednesday afternoon and requested a medical conference with a flight surgeon. NASA’s medical staff routinely schedule sessions with astronauts on the ISS. The conversations are carried out on private channels and are not heard on the public crew communication loops that NASA makes available for online streaming. NASA then removed the public space station audio stream, which is on YouTube, later in the day.

If the Crew-11 mission returns to Earth early, the Dragon spacecraft will bring home all four of its crew, likely heading for a reentry and splashdown in the Pacific Ocean. A SpaceX recovery vessel based in Southern California is designed to retrieve the crew and the Dragon spacecraft.

A premature departure from the ISS would leave behind NASA astronaut Chris Williams and two Russian cosmonauts who launched to the space station in November on a Russian Soyuz vehicle. Williams and his crewmates—Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and Sergey Mikayev—have their own lifeboat in the Soyuz spacecraft.

The next US crew mission is scheduled to launch no earlier than February 15, when another SpaceX Dragon spacecraft will head to the ISS with a fresh four-person crew booked to stay in orbit until late this year.

Updated at 3:20 am EST on January 8 with additional details.