There is no more mystery about which astronaut suffered a medical issue aboard the International Space Station last month, prompting NASA’s first-ever medical evacuation.
Astronaut Mike Fincke, 58, has identified himself as the one who was in need of help in a statement published by NASA on Wednesday.
“On Jan. 7, while aboard the International Space Station, I experienced a medical event that required immediate attention from my incredible teammates,” Fincke said in the statement.
Fincke said he’s “doing very well” and is still undergoing “post-flight reconditioning,” though he did not specify what health issue prompted the need for medical evacuation.
On one hand, I agree.
On the other, we paid for him to go up there, kinda feels like what happened should be public. But plenty of our taxes go to keeping actually bad things secret and that’s worse.
I’m just curious
I feel like if it were something related to the flight/mission they would probably be talking about it. Most likely this is something unexpected (pre-mission medical screening won’t allow anyone with risks to fly, there are always backup crew prepared for every launch) and probably completely unrelated to spaceflight, just bad timing.
With the possible exception of maybe arthritis, and I’ve never heard of acute arthritis before, I can’t think of a single medical condition that wouldn’t be exacerbated by being in zero g.
As employers we are not allowed to pry into personal health issues.