{"id":369049,"date":"2026-01-14T09:14:15","date_gmt":"2026-01-14T09:14:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/369049\/"},"modified":"2026-01-14T09:14:15","modified_gmt":"2026-01-14T09:14:15","slug":"inside-nasas-first-medical-evacuation-from-space","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/369049\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside Nasa\u2019s first medical evacuation from space"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Crew Dragon capsule is due to undock from the International Space Station on Wednesday, carrying three astronauts and a cosmonaut back to Earth on an unprecedented medical evacuation mission.<\/p>\n

The four known as Crew 11, made up of the astronauts Mike Fincke, Zena Cardman, Kimiya Yui and the Russian cosmonaut Oleg Platonov, spent Tuesday packing up after a five-month stay aboard the ISS, which was cut short when one of them had an unspecified medical problem.<\/p>\n

During a change-of-command ceremony on the ISS on Monday Fincke, 58, formally handed over his position as station commander to Sergey Kud-Sverchov, 42, from Russia.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Astronaut sickness prompts first evacuation from space station<\/a><\/p>\n

Fincke has described the decision by the head of Nasa, Jared Isaacman, to abandon the last five weeks of Crew 11\u2019s rotation as \u201cthe right call, even if it\u2019s a bit bittersweet\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The Crew Dragon capsule will undock from the space station on Wednesday<\/p>\n

NASA\/AP<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst and foremost, we are all OK. Everyone on board is stable, safe and well cared for,\u201d he wrote on social media, adding that they looked forward to \u201cresolving any medical questions with the best care available\u201d. <\/p>\n

It is the first time that astronauts have had to come home for health reasons. The identity of the unwell astronaut has not been revealed, nor details of their medical issue, which cropped up last Thursday and forced the cancellation of a scheduled spacewalk in which Fincke and Cardman were due to work on maintenance tasks.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Sign up for The Times\u2019s weekly US newsletter<\/a><\/p>\n

During Monday\u2019s ceremony on the live space-to-ground video feed, the Crew 11 commander Cardman, 38, said: \u201cThe timing of this departure is unexpected, but what was not surprising to me was how well this crew came together as a family to help each other and just take care of each other.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis has been such an incredible experience. This is a place that I longed to see for myself. I could never have dreamed up a better crew to share this experience with.\u201d <\/p>\n

Cardman looked solemn as Fincke told her: \u201cZena, you\u2019re a rock star, superstar, awesome star. It\u2019s been a pleasure serving with you, watching you see Earth for the first time rising on the rocket and now it\u2019s coming to an end where we get to go home. It\u2019s bittersweet.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

Two members of the crew had been due to do repairs but their space walk was cancelled<\/p>\n

REUTERS<\/p>\n

Coming back to Earth \u201cwas a deliberate decision to allow the right medical evaluations to happen on the ground, where the full range of diagnostic capability exists,\u201d Fincke added online.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis decision was made calmly and carefully, with people at the centre. What stands out to me is how clearly Nasa cares about its people. Flight surgeons, engineers, managers and support teams came together quickly and professionally to chart the best path forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

The ISS carries a range of medical supplies and equipment for treating illness and injury, such as intravenous therapy kits, an ultrasound machine, a defibrillator and what Nasa calls a \u201crobust pharmacy\u201d that stocks over 190 drugs including pain relievers, motion sickness tablets, anti-psychotic drugs and anti-depressants.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Nasa\u2019s first trip to the moon in 50 years could launch in February<\/a><\/p>\n

The space station orbits at an average altitude of 250 miles from Earth. Crew 11\u2019s Dragon spacecraft is due to undock from the orbiting complex at 5pm EST on Wednesday, fire its engines at 2.40am EST on Thursday to drop it out of orbit and begin the fiery re-entry through Earth\u2019s atmosphere.<\/p>\n

Splashdown in the Pacific Ocean, off the California coast, is due at 3.40am Thursday. The capsule will then be scooped aboard a recovery vessel and the crew flown ashore.<\/p>\n

Thanking ground-based teams, Cardman said: \u201cYou have been an incredible support through this whole expedition \u2026 it just has been the honour of a lifetime to share this with you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fincke said: \u201cIt was really fun. Some of the jokes weren\u2019t so good, but I\u2019ll keep trying.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Crew Dragon capsule is due to undock from the International Space Station on Wednesday, carrying three astronauts…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":369050,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[90,416,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-369049","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-science","tag-space","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369049","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=369049"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369049\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/369050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=369049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=369049"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=369049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}