Crew-8 Astronaut Released from Hospital, Back in Houston

The NASA astronaut who was hospitalized yesterday after returning from an eight-month spaceflight is now back in Houston. For privacy reasons, NASA will not provide any details about which of the three NASA astronauts was taken ill or why, only that the astronaut was taken to a Pensacola hospital and remained there overnight for observation.

NASA astronauts Matt Dominick, Mike Barratt and Jeanette Epps and Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksandr Grebenkin splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico near Pensacola yesterday morning, October 25, at 3:29 am ET.

Initially, their return appeared routine.

NASA purchases crew transportation services from SpaceX and the crew returned on Crew Dragon Endeavour. SpaceX provided live coverage of splashdown and each crew member exiting the spacecraft onto the deck of the recovery ship.  All were smiling and waving after the recovery crew helped them slide out and briefly stand up — experiencing gravity for the first time after eight months in weightlessness — as they turned to sit and recline on stretchers to be taken for routine medical checkups aboard ship.

At a 5:00 am ET post-splashdown media teleconference, NASA officials gave no sign that anything was amiss. Richard Jones, Deputy Manager of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, reported that “Right now the crew is doing great. They are going to spend a little bit of time on the recovery vessel going through their medical checks and they’ll soon be on their way back to Houston.”

But at about 8:00 am, NASA posted on its commercial crew blog and on X that all four crew members had been taken to a local medical facility for additional evaluation. By afternoon, three had returned to Houston, but the fourth remained at the Ascension Sacred Heart Pensacola hospital in stable condition for observation. Other than acknowledging it was a NASA astronaut — so not Grebenkin — the agency would not divulge who was experiencing a medical problem or what it was.

Today at 1:31 pm ET, NASA issued a statement via email (later posted on the blog) that the fourth astronaut had been released and also was now back in Houston.

NASA said that would be their final statement on this topic.

NASA usually has post-mission briefings with returning ISS crews after a week or so. More information might become available at that time.

Crew-8 launched on March 3, 2024 EDT (March 4 UTC) for what was expected to be a six-month mission on the ISS, returning in mid-August after Crew-9 arrived to replace them. But it was extended to almost eight months — 235 days — because of operational changes and inclement weather.

NASA delayed Crew-9’s launch and Crew-8’s return while deciding what to do about the Boeing Starliner CFT crew, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams. If they couldn’t come home on Starliner, they would need two of the four seats on Crew-9 and two of the original Crew-9 astronauts would have to stay home. That’s ultimately what NASA decided to do.  Crew-9’s Nick Hague (NASA) and Aleksandr Gorbunov (Roscosmos) launched on September 28 and arrived the next day.

After the usual handover period, Crew-8 was getting ready to come home in early October, but lousy weather in Florida delayed it for almost three weeks. They undocked on Wednesday at 5:05 pm ET and splashed down about 34 hours later at 3:29 am ET Friday.