\n<\/p>\n
\n The four crew members of NASA\u2019s SpaceX Crew-11 mission to the International Space Station<\/p>\n SpaceX<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n For the first time, astronauts are being evacuated from the International Space Station (ISS) for medical reasons. The exact nature of the \u201cmedical situation\u201d has not been identified for privacy reasons, nor has the astronaut it has affected. But four of the seven crew members onboard the ISS are coming home early.<\/p>\n The astronauts returning to Earth are the members of the Crew-11 mission, which launched on 1 August and was originally planned to return in late February. In an 8 January press conference, NASA administrator Jared Isaacman said that the decision to return the astronauts early was made in part because the mission objectives are nearly all complete, so ending the mission early is not as big of a deal.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cBecause the astronaut is absolutely stable, this is not an emergent evacuation,\u201d said NASA\u2019s chief health and medical officer, James Polk, during the press conference. \u201cWe\u2019re not immediately disembarking and getting the astronaut down.\u201d Emergency medical evacuations could be performed in a matter of hours, Isaacman said, but in this case the crew will be evacuated in the next few days.<\/p>\n There have been medical incidents aboard the ISS before, but until now all of them have been minor enough that they could be dealt with in orbit. \u201cWe have a very robust suite of medical hardware onboard the International Space Station, but we don\u2019t have the complete amount of hardware that I would have in the emergency department, for example, to complete a workup of the patient,\u201d said Polk. \u201cThe medical incident was sufficient enough that we were concerned enough about the astronaut [and] we would like to complete that workup, and the best way to complete that workup is on the ground.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The entire crew \u2013 two NASA astronauts, one Russian cosmonaut, and one Japanese astronaut \u2013 will ride home aboard the same Dragon spacecraft that shuttled them to the ISS, despite only one of them being ill or injured. Several medical facilities on Earth will be prepared ahead of time to take in the affected crew member for tests and treatment. While this situation is unprecedented, the actual evacuation operation is not significantly different from how crews usually return to Earth at the end of their missions, Isaacman said.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the 25 years of the history of the International Space Station we\u2019ve had many models\u2026 that have said that we should\u2019ve had a medical evacuation approximately every 3 years \u2026 and we\u2019ve not had one to date,\u201d says Polk. <\/p>\n The evacuation will leave just one NASA astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts aboard the ISS until the arrival of the Crew-12 mission, which was originally slated to launch around 15 February but may be moved up after this incident.<\/p>\n Topics:<\/p>\n<\/section><\/div>\n