Cape Canaveral, Fla.: A medical problem sidelined one of four astronauts assigned to SpaceX for an upcoming flight to the International Space Station and delayed the launch, officials said Monday.
NASA said the launch is now closed until Saturday night at the earliest. Liftoff was scheduled for this past Sunday, but bad weather pushed it to Wednesday. It is the first time in decades that the health of a crew member on a US flight has been delayed.
Officials would not say which astronauts are affected. He called it a minor medical problem and said that it has nothing to do with COVID-19. A German and three American astronauts aged between 34 and 61 have been quarantined for two weeks.
Once on their way, Raja Chari, Tom Marshburn, Kayla Barron and the European Space Agency’s Mathias Maurer will move to the space station for six months, replacing the four astronauts who have been living there since April. NASA prefers to launch new crews before bringing back older ones so they can handover face-to-face, but the latest is considering all options in light of the delay.
In 1990, a shuttle launch was delayed when the flight commander had a cold. And in 1970, an astronaut was flown from Apollo 13 shortly before launch after being exposed to German measles. He never suffered from measles, and later joined the hard-fought effort in Houston to save his colleagues from their aborted moon missions.
Recently, two Russian astronauts were replaced months before their 2020 space station launch, after one of them suffered an eye injury.
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The Associated Press Department of Health and Science is supported by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Department of Science Education. AP is solely responsible for all content.
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