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Earlier this year, a SpaceX crew returned to Earth a month early after one astronaut experienced a medical incident
In a new interview, NASA astronaut Mike Fincke said that he was eating dinner when the incident occurred
“It was completely out of the blue,” he said
The NASA astronaut whose medical scare led to his crew’s unprecedented evacuation from the International Space Station said doctors still aren’t sure exactly what happened.
Speaking from Houston’s Johnson Space Center, Mike Fincke told the Associated Press that he was eating dinner on Wednesday, January 7, when he suddenly couldn’t speak. The incident struck like “a very, very fast lightning bolt” and lasted about 20 minutes.
“It was completely out of the blue,” Fincke, 59, told the AP. “It was just amazingly quick.”
Although he couldn’t remember being in pain, Fincke said his crewmates could tell he was in distress. “It was all hands on deck within just a matter of seconds,” he said, declining to share more about the episode.
Although he’s doing well now, he said that to this day, doctors haven’t been able to pinpoint exactly what happened.
While doctors have ruled out a heart attack, “everything else is still on the table,” he told the AP, noting that the incident also could have been related to the fact that by that point in his career, he’d accumulated 549 days in space.
(Clockwise from bottom left) Mike Fincke, Oleg Platonov, Zena Cardman and Kimiya Yui.
Credit: NASA
As a result of the medical scare, Crew-11 returned to Earth on Thursday, January 15, more than a month early.
Including the most recent expedition, the retired Air Force colonel has completed four space missions and nine spacewalks, according to NASA. This was his first medical issue in space — and the medical evacuation from the ISS was a first for the space agency as well.
Although it was initially unclear which astronaut’s medical scare prompted the evacuation, Fincke revealed he was the one to experience the “medical event” last month.
“After further evaluation, NASA determined that the safest course was an early return for Crew-11 — not an emergency, but a carefully coordinated plan to be able to take advantage of advanced medical imaging not available on the space station,” Fincke said in a statement shared by NASA. “On Jan. 15, we splashed down off the coast of San Diego after an amazing five-and-a-half-month mission.”
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“I’m doing very well and continuing standard post-flight reconditioning at NASA’S Johnson Space Center in Houston,” Finke added. “Spaceflight is an incredible privilege, and sometimes it reminds us just how human we are. “Thank you all for your support.”
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