ISS astronauts return to Earth early after historic evacuation: What NASA says about Crew-11 “medical concern”
The four astronauts on the SpaceX Crew-11 mission have splashed down on Earth, after their stay on the ISS was cut short.
NASA’s administrator says the crew member at the heart of an unprecedented medical evacuation of the International Space Station (ISS) is “doing fine”, after the four astronauts on the agency’s SpaceX Crew-11 mission completed their return to Earth.
“Safe and in good spirits”
In a press conference, NASA chief Jared Isaacman confirmed that the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft, carrying U.S. astronauts Zena Cardman and Mike Fincke, Japanese astronaut Kimiya Yui, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Platonov, successfully splashed down off the coast of California at 3:41 a.m. ET on Thursday morning.
The four crew members “are all safe and in good spirits”, Isaacman said. “All crew members are currently undergoing the routine, post-splashdown medical evaluation,” he added. “The crew member of concern is doing fine. We will share updates on their health as soon as it’s appropriate to do so.”
“Medical situation” leads to Crew-11’s early return
On Thursday last week, NASA had announced that Cardman, Fincke, Yui and Platonov would be returning from the ISS a month ahead of schedule, after a member of the crew “experienced a medical situation”. A day earlier, the space agency had cancelled a planned space walk over a “medical concern”.
NASA has so far refused to identify the astronaut affected, or specify the nature of the health problem they have experienced. “Due to medical privacy, it is not appropriate for NASA to share more details about the crew member,” the agency said in a statement on Tuesday.
The members of the Crew-11 mission had been on the ISS since August 2 last year, having launched from NASA’s John F. Kennedy Space Center in Merritt Island, Florida, a day earlier. They had been scheduled to remain on the space station until late February.
This is the first time in NASA history that a crewed mission into space has ended ahead of schedule due to a medical problem.
Welcome home! #Crew11 @NASA_Astronauts Zena Cardman, Mike Fincke, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Kimiya Yui, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Platonov splashed down off the coast of California after 167 days days in space as part of Expedition 74 aboard the… pic.twitter.com/BYwrkYSpTI
— NASA HQ PHOTO (@nasahqphoto) January 15, 2026
“NASA at its finest”
Despite the astronauts’ early return, Isaacman insisted: “Over the past five months aboard the International Space Station, Crew-11 completed a series of demanding and productive mission objectives […].
“To be overwhelmingly clear, Crew-11 was a very successful mission. While this was the first time we had to return crew slightly ahead of schedule, NASA was ready. The team responded quickly and professionally, as did the teams across the agency, working closely with our commercial partners and executing a very safe return.
“This is exactly why we train and this is NASA at its finest. Space flight will always carry some degree of uncertainty; that is the nature of exploration.”
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