ISS stint ends early as NASA aborts Crew-11 over crew illness

NASA astronaut Mike Fincke has handed command of the ISS to Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergey Kud-Sverchkov as Fincke and the rest of Crew-11 are scheduled to head back to Earth on Wednesday. The departure is more than a month earlier than planned and comes after NASA's decision to end the Crew-11 mission due to a medical concern …

[Paul Herber]

I would hate to get toothache while in space, or earache even, or even a paper cut!

But you're not going to be going up there if there is any sign of tooth decay.

[Like a badger]

Constipation due to the low gravity I reckon. If only the design had specced a centrifugal pod for the shitter.

"I can't shift my breakfast chaps, can you crank it up to 2G, please?"

[PRR]

> I can't shift my breakfast chaps, can you crank it up....

Castor oil. You can still get it, tho last time we had to get the pharmacist involved. (It was on the shelves but shouldered-aside by all the name-brand high-profit potions.)

[The Organ Grinder's Monkey]

Horrible mental image of an astronaut clinging desperately to a fast-moving space-croucher as it whips round in a blur, with an impressive "brown-trout" & several feet of his own entrails flailing in his wake...

[Dr Who]

Panspermia is unstoppable. Let's hope it's benign.

[Eclectic Man]

Medicine in Space

Dr Kevin Fong did the UK's 'Royal Institution Christmas Lectures' one year on space medicine. The ISS has minimal medical facilities as firstly, astronauts and cosmonauts are really super healthy people, and all the medical equipment would have to be blasted into orbit in competition with scientific experiments. They are also super careful about avoiding injuries etc, so hope there are no serious medical emergencies up there. But sadly, they cannot cater for every eventuality.

https://www.rigb.org/about-how-survive-space

[Spazturtle]

Re: Medicine in Space

One of the problems is the bone loss, all those minerals have to go somewhere, so 200g of minerals is being dumped into their astronauts kidneys every month.

[I ain't Spartacus]

Re: Medicine in Space

They quarantine for 2 weeks before launch. And that's assuming no delays. So there's a pretty low risk of infectious disease. Unless the Jehovah's Witnesses and door-to-door salesmen are really determined. That leaves long-term health problems and injuries - and they're a healthy lot in a very controlled environment, with lots of medical monitoring. Which, I guess, is why this is so rare - it's the first time I can remember it happening.

I guess even when you're an astronaut, you can get a phone consultation easily, but actually getting to see your doctor takes ages...

[Pascal Monett]

"a medical concern involving one of the four astronauts"

It's a space virus ! Don't bring him back, that's how the zombie apocalypse starts !

[The Oncoming Scorn]

Re: "a medical concern involving one of the four astronauts"

It's not Victor Carroon is it?

[Fruit and Nutcase]

Re: "a medical concern involving one of the four astronauts"

Space Virus...

Trump and his Health Secretary will come up some interesting ways of dealing with something like that

[Excused Boots]

Re: "a medical concern involving one of the four astronauts"

No, he’ll send out some late night tweet instructing Noem to ‘DEPLOY ICE AGENTS TO ROUND UP THE VIRUS’, it’s almost better if you use all caps!