Latest news on ISS astronaut medical evacuation: NASA weighs return to Earth options

Former astronauts weigh-in on ISS situation

Former Canadian Space Agency astronaut Chris Hadfield posted his thoughts regarding NASA’s recent decision to fly Crew-11 astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) back to Earth due to an ongoing medical issue.

“Big decision by NASA leadership, with multiple domino impacts on operations, but I’m glad to see, as always, crew health and safety come first,” Hadfield wrote on X.

Normally, NASA overlaps incoming and outgoing crews aboard the ISS, but with the possibility of evacuating Crew-11 before Crew-12’s arrival, Hadfield voiced confidence. “The Station will be more vulnerable until the replacement crew of 4 can launch, but we have deep experience running the place with just 3 astronauts for a while,” he wrote.

Former NASA astronaut Ed Lu also weighed in on X. “The afflicted space station astronaut … is almost certainly feeling they have let down the crew. We were trained to get the mission done. But I do trust NASA to do the right thing here.”

It’s still unclear when exactly Crew-11 will depart the station, or when and if NASA will determine an earlier launch date for Crew-12.

ISS astronaut evacuation won’t affect Artemis 2 moon launch

NASA’s plan to rturn the four Crew-11 astronauts home early from the International Space Station and accelerate the launch of their replacement team, Crew-12, from Florida should not impact the agency’s plans to also launch another crew of astronauts to the moon in February.

NASA chief Jared Isaacman said Thursday that NASA’s Artemis 2 mission, which will launch four astronauts around the moon, will remain on track to launch in early February. The mission will lift off from the Kennedy Space Center, where SpaceX will also launch the Crew-12 astronauts. The Crew-11 astronauts will also have to splashdown off the Florida coast before then.

“These would be totally separate campaigns at this point,” Isaacman said during a Jan. 8 press conference to provide an update on NASA’s decision to end Crew-11 early. “There’s no reason to believe at this point in time that there’d be any overlap that we have to deconflict for.”

You can read the full story here by Staff Writer Josh Dinner.

NASA prepares to return 4 astronauts home early

NASA is drawing up plans today to return four Crew-11 astronauts to Earth from the International Space Station earlier than planned due to a medical concern with one of the space travelers. We will have the latest updates as events unfold here.

The Crew-11 astronauts are NASA’s Mike Fincke and Zena Cardman, Japan’s Kimuya Yui, and Russia’s Oleg Platonov. NASA officials canceled a planned Jan. 8 spacewalk by Fincke and Cardman due to the medical concern, but the agency has not said which of the four astronauts suffered the medical issue out of privacy concerns.

The astronaut who suffered the medical issue is in a stable condition, but NASA does want to return them to Earth where they can receive treatment with better care than the conditions on the ISS allow.

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman announced his decision to bring the Crew-11 astronauts home early on their SpaceX Dragon capsule on Thursday (Jan. 8). The agency is now drawing up plans to both undock the Crew-11 Dragon and splashdown off the Florida coast early, while also accelerating the planned launch of a replacement crew on the SpaceX Crew-12 mission.

The departure of the Crew-11 astronauts will leave NASA astronaut Chris Williams and two cosmonauts, Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and Sergei Mikayev, on their own on the ISS. Crew-11 launched to the ISS in August 2025, with Williams and crew launching on a Soyuz rocket in November.

Watch this space for more updates on this developing story.

Tariq Malik