Cape Canaveral, Florida- The International Space Station It returned to full capacity with the arrival on Saturday of four new astronauts to replace colleagues who retired early due to health problems.
SpaceX delivered to the American, French and Russian astronauts a day after launching them from Cape Canaveral.
Last month’s medical evacuation was NASA’s first in 65 years of human spaceflight. One of the four astronauts launched by SpaceX last summer suffered what authorities described as a serious health problem, prompting his hasty return. That left only three crew members to keep the site running – one American and two Russians – prompting NASA to pause spacewalks and cut back on research.
1/7 | SpaceX capsule lands with the two astronauts who were stranded on the International Space Station. Astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who were stranded in space, landed safely Tuesday afternoon, culminating a long mission that began with a failed Boeing test flight more than nine months ago. – The Associated Press
Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway from NASA, Sophie Adenot from France, and Andrei Fedyaev from Russia will settle there for eight or nine months. Meir, a marine biologist, and Fedyaev, a former military pilot, have lived there before. During her first visit to the station in 2019, Meir participated in the first all-female spacewalk.
Adenot, a military helicopter pilot, is the second French woman to fly in space. Hathaway is a captain in the US Navy.
The POT has refused to reveal the identity of the astronaut who fell ill in orbit on January 7 or explain what happened, citing reasons of medical privacy. The sick astronaut and three others returned to Earth more than a month ahead of schedule. They spent their first night in the hospital before returning to Houston.
The space agency said it did not alter its pre-flight medical checks for its replacements.