{"id":483281,"date":"2026-02-16T08:14:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T08:14:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/483281\/"},"modified":"2026-02-16T08:14:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-16T08:14:10","slug":"four-new-astronauts-arrive-at-iss-restoring-a-full-crew-for-research-sciencealert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/483281\/","title":{"rendered":"Four New Astronauts Arrive at ISS, Restoring a Full Crew For Research : ScienceAlert"},"content":{"rendered":"

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) \u2013 The International Space Station<\/a> returned to full strength with Saturday’s arrival of four new astronauts to replace colleagues who bailed early because of health concerns.<\/p>\n

SpaceX delivered the US, French, and Russian astronauts a day after launching them<\/a> from Cape Canaveral.<\/p>\n

Last month’s medical evacuation<\/a> was NASA’s first in 65 years of human spaceflight. One of four astronauts<\/a> launched by SpaceX last summer suffered what officials described as a serious health issue, prompting their hasty return.<\/p>\n

That left only three crew members to keep the place running \u2013 one American and two Russians \u2013 prompting NASA to pause spacewalks and trim research.<\/p>\n

\"YouTube frameborder=”0\u2033 allow=”accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share” referrerpolicy=”strict-origin-when-cross-origin” allowfullscreen><\/p>\n

Moving in for eight to nine months are NASA’s Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, France’s Sophie Adenot, and Russia’s Andrei Fedyaev.<\/p>\n

Meir, a marine biologist, and Fedyaev, a former military pilot, have lived up there before.<\/p>\n

During her first station visit in 2019, Meir took part in the first all-female spacewalk<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Adenot, a military helicopter pilot, is only the second French woman to fly in space. Hathaway is a captain in the US Navy.<\/p>\n

\"SevenForeground from left: Andrei Fedyaev, Jack Hathaway, Jessica Meir, and Sophie Adenot gather with background from left: Russian Sergey Kud-Sverchkov, American Christopher Williams, and Russian Sergei Mikayev, after a new crew entered the ISS on Saturday, Feb. 14, 2026. (NASA via AP)<\/p>\n

“Bonjour!” Adenot called out once the capsule docked to the space station 277 miles (446 kilometers) up.<\/p>\n

A couple of hours later, the hatches swung open, and the seven space travelers hugged and exchanged exuberant high-fives.<\/p>\n

“Let’s get rolling,” Meir said.<\/p>\n

\"Subscribe<\/a><\/p>\n

NASA has refused to divulge the identity of the astronaut who fell ill in orbit on Jan. 7 or explain what happened, citing medical privacy.<\/p>\n

The ailing astronaut and three others returned to Earth more than a month sooner than planned.<\/p>\n

Related: Astronauts Reveal Critical Medical Tool Used in ISS Health Crisis<\/a><\/p>\n

They spent their first night back on Earth at the hospital before returning to Houston.<\/p>\n

The space agency said it did not alter its preflight medical checks for their replacements.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) \u2013 The International Space Station returned to full strength with Saturday’s arrival of four…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":483282,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[64,63,128,285],"class_list":["post-483281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-science","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=483281"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483281\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/483282"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=483281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=483281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=483281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}