NASA orders “controlled medical evacuation” from the International Space Station

NASA officials said Thursday that they have decided to bring four of the seven crew members home to the International Space Station after one of them experienced a “medical situation” earlier this week.

The space agency has said little about the incident and officials have not identified which crew member suffered from the medical problem. James “JD” Polk, NASA's chief health and medical officer, told reporters Thursday that the crew member is “absolutely stable” but that the agency is “erring on the side of caution” with the decision to return the astronaut to Earth.

The ailing astronaut is part of the Crew-11 mission, which launched to the station on August 1 and is scheduled to return to Earth around February 20. Instead, the Crew-11 astronauts will leave the International Space Station (ISS) in the coming days and head for reentry and a parachute-assisted splashdown in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California.

“After discussions with our Chief Health and Medical Officer, Dr. JD Polk, and the leadership of the entire agency, I have determined that it is in the best interests of our astronauts to return Crew-11 before their scheduled departure,” NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said Thursday.

The Crew-11 mission is led by Commander Zena Cardman, 38, who is completing her first mission to space. Second in command is pilot Mike Fincke, a 58-year-old astronaut on his fourth space flight. Japanese astronaut Kimiya Yui, 55, and Russian cosmonaut Oleg Platonov, 39, complete the crew.

Isaacman said NASA will release more information about Crew-11's disconnect and re-entry schedule within the next 48 hours. The crew will return home aboard the same SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft they launched on more than five months ago. The entire crew must return to Earth together as they rely on the same Dragon spacecraft as a lifeboat.

“For more than 60 years, NASA has set the standard for safety and security in human spaceflight,” Isaacman said. “In these efforts, including the 25 years of continuous human presence aboard the International Space Station, the health and well-being of our astronauts has always been and will remain our top priority.”

Persistent risk

Polk, a physician who has been NASA's chief medical officer since 2016, said the agency is not ready to release details about the medical issue, citing privacy concerns. “I'm not going to talk about any particular astronaut or any particular diagnosis,” Polk said. “I would ask that we still respect the astronaut's privacy.”