NASA confirms first flight to ISS after 'medevac'

NASA said SpaceX's Crew-12 mission is set to launch next week and return the ISS to full crew size after Crew-11 left the station early in January due to a medical reason - the first such case in ISS history.

According to NASA, Crew-12 is scheduled to be sent into orbit on a Falcon 9 rocket with the Crew Dragon spacecraft. The launch time is marked as no earlier than 6:01 a.m. local time on Wednesday (for a window of 11 February), although the schedule remained under pressure from technical factors and compatibility constraints with other launches.

Adding to the certainty of the mission was a regulatory decision: after a temporary pause in Falcon 9 flights amid an investigation into a second-stage anomaly, SpaceX worked with the US Federal Aviation Administration, and it sounded late in the week that the rocket was being cleared to return to flight.

Crew-12 is to succeed Crew-11, which returned to Earth ahead of plan in mid-January due to a medical problem in one of its crew members. NASA did not disclose details of the condition. After that, a reduced three-person crew temporarily worked on the station while the agency expedited preparations for the next rotation.

Crew-12's lineup is international: Jessica Mair (commander), Jack Hathaway (pilot), ESA astronaut Sophie Adeno and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev. Fedyaev replaced Oleg Artemyev at the end of 2025; officially this was explained by a job transfer, while the media discussed versions related to "safety" and rules for handling sensitive information.

The mission takes place against the backdrop of talk about the final phase of the ISS project: NASA and partners are preparing plans for a controlled deorbiting of the station after the end of its operation, as well as the transition to commercial orbital platforms.