“Since the astronaut is absolutely stable, this is not an emergency evacuation,” James “JD” Polk, NASA’s chief medical officer, said at a news conference last week. “We’re not going to land the astronauts right away.”
Boundless Kshatriya, the agency’s associate administrator, called the situation a “controlled medical evacuation” in a briefing with reporters.
But without a confirmed diagnosis of the astronaut’s medical problem, there was some “prolonged risk” to the astronaut’s health if they remained in orbit, Polk said. That’s why NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman and his representatives agreed to end the Crew-11 mission early.
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The Crew-11 mission was launched on August 1 and was to remain at the space station until about February 20, a few days after the scheduled arrival of SpaceX’s Crew-12 mission with a team of replacement astronauts. But the early departure means the space station will operate with a crew of three until Crew-12 launches next month.
NASA astronaut Chris Williams will be the sole astronaut responsible for maintenance of the American segment of the station. Russian astronauts Sergei Kud-Sverchkov and Sergei Mikayev launched with Williams on a Russian Soyuz vehicle in November. Crew Dragon was the lifeboat for all four Crew-11 astronauts, so as per standard procedure the entire crew had to return, including the astronaut suffering from an unknown medical problem.
The space station regularly operated with only three crew members for the first decade of its existence. The complex has been permanently staffed since 2000, sometimes with only two astronauts or cosmonauts. The standard crew size was increased to six in 2009, then to seven in 2020.
SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Attempt The spacecraft descends toward the Pacific Ocean under four main parachutes.
Credit: NASA
SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Attempt The spacecraft descends toward the Pacific Ocean under four main parachutes.
Credit: NASA
Williams would have his hands free until reinforcements arrived. The small crew will not be able to perform any spacewalks, and some of the laboratory’s science programs may have to be postponed to ensure the crew can continue maintenance operations.
This is the first time that NASA has called for an early termination of a space mission for medical reasons, but the Soviet Union faced similar situations several times during the Cold War. In 1985, Russian officials cut short a mission to the Salyut 7 space station after the mission’s commander fell ill in orbit. A similar situation happened with the Soyuz 21 mission to the Salyut 5 space station in 1976.
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