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A crew member from Crew-11 on the ISS is reportedly unwell, but NASA affirms that the astronaut’s state is consistent.(Image credit: NASA/Robert Markowitz)ShareShare by:
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Because of a health problem that surfaced on Wednesday (Jan. 7) with one of the astronauts present, NASA has put off a space excursion outside the International Space Station (ISS) and is weighing up an early repatriation of its team, the agency declared.
The extravehicular activity was set for 8 a.m. ET on Thursday (Jan. 8) to complete preparations on a power conduit where a fresh solar panel is scheduled for installation on the ISS. U.S. astronauts Mike Fincke and Zena Cardman were slated to leave the space station for a 6.5-hour duration, in what would’ve signified Cardman’s maiden spacewalk. (Fincke already has nine spacewalks to his name.)
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“NASA and our collaborators train for these scenarios and make preparations to handle them in a safe manner,” a NASA representative stated in an email issued on Thursday.
Nonetheless, the organization is thinking about transporting Fincke, Cardman, and a couple of other astronauts, who constitute the present four-member crew aboard the ISS, back from their sojourn at the orbiting station sooner than anticipated. “Safely carrying out our missions remains our primary focus, and we are thoroughly examining all avenues, including the potential for ending Crew-11’s mission prematurely,” the representative conveyed.
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Crew-11 got to the ISS on Aug. 2, 2025. Fincke and Cardman were accompanied by Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Kimiya Yui and Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Platonov for a six-month stay, following which Crew-12 was planned to replace them as part of the space station’s usual crew change.
The launch of Crew-12 is on the books for the middle of February. The implications for the ISS of repatriating Crew-11 early are not immediately clear, since these alterations to the standard cycle are quite out of the ordinary. However, additional astronauts are presently located on the space station, including NASA’s Christopher Williams and Russian cosmonauts Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and Sergey Mikayev, who made their way to the orbiting lab aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft that decimated its launchpad in November.
More updates from NASA are anticipated in the hours ahead.
TOPICSinternational space stationNASA
Sascha PareSocial Links NavigationStaff writer
Sascha is a U.K.-based staff writer at Live Science. She holds a bachelor’s degree in biology from the University of Southampton in England and a master’s degree in science communication from Imperial College London. Her work has appeared in The Guardian and the health website Zoe. Besides writing, she enjoys playing tennis, bread-making and browsing second-hand shops for hidden gems.
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