00:00The ISS has been in operation for 25 years, and this is its first ever medical evacuation.
00:06This was a serious medical condition. That is why we're pursuing this path.
00:12Crew member is stable. As we mentioned, we're not electing an emergency to orbit.
00:15But obviously, as we've already communicated, the capability to diagnose and treat this properly does not live on the International Space Station.
00:24NASA did not say what the issue was or which crew member was affected, citing medical secrecy.
00:32U.S. astronauts Zena Cardman and Mike Fink, Japanese astronauts Kamiya Yui and cosmonaut Oleg Platinov arrived in August last year.
00:40Now the crewmates are returning to Earth four months earlier than planned.
00:46It leaves a skeleton crew of just three aboard the space station.
00:49Earlier this week, Cardman and Fink were meant to carry out a spacewalk, which was cancelled.
00:55Spacewalk preparations involve increasing oxygen intake and reducing pressure, but NASA said the incidence was unrelated.
01:02They practiced the spacewalk and the pre-breathe many, many, many times, but this was not related to the operations or the spacewalk at all.
01:11Zena Cardman was bumped off a previous mission to make space for the return of Barry Wilmore and Suni Williams,
01:17who were famously stuck aboard the ISS for months after their capsule malfunctioned.
01:22Zena Cardman was just about to make her first spacewalk, and now she's going home.
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