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Crew 11 safely splashes down after shortened mission
Four space station crewmates undocked and plunged back to Earth Thursday, safely splashing down in the Pacific Ocean off the California coast six days after NASA ordered them home early because of a medical issue.
VideoNASA, SpaceX conduct ‘medical evacuation’ Crew-11 return to Earth
The three astronauts and cosmonaut are scheduled to undock from the space station at 5:05 p.m. EST (2205 UTC) on Wednesday, Jan. 14, and splashdown off the coast of California at 3:41 a.m. EST (0841 UTC).
VideoSpaceX breaks pad turnaround record at Cape Canaveral with midday Starlink launch
The Starlink 6-98 mission added 29 Starlink V2 Mini Optimized satellites to the low Earth orbit constellation. Liftoff from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station happened at 1:08 p.m. EST (1808 UTC).

U.S. Space Force switches rockets for upcoming GPS satellite launch
The change will allow the U.S. Space Force to expedite the process of building out its GPS constellation in medium Earth orbit. The launch date for the next satellite, GPS III Space Vehicle 09, could be within weeks.
VideoISS gains new commander as Crew-11 prepares midweek departure
NASA astronaut Mike Fincke took over command of the International Space Station on Dec. 7, 2025. He and the rest of the SpaceX Crew-11 mission will undock from the ISS on Jan. 14.
VideoSpaceX launches 29 Starlink satellites on Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral
The Starlink 6-97 mission was the fifth Falcon 9 rocket launch of 2026, a rate of roughly one flight every 2.5 days. Liftoff from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station happened at 4:08:20 p.m. EST (2108:20 UTC).
VideoSpaceX deploys NASA’s Pandora, other smallsats amid 1st ‘Twilight’ rideshare mission
The flight included 40 deployment events for a variety of payloads, including NASA’s Pandora spacecraft. Liftoff from pad 4E happened at 5:44 a.m. PST (8:44 a.m. EST / 1344 UTC).

Crew-11 to cut mission short and return to Earth due to medical issue
In keeping with the agency's strict medical privacy policy, NASA officials have not identified the astronaut in question or provided any details about the nature of the medical issue.
VideoFCC gives SpaceX “green light” to expand Starlink constellation to 15,000 satellites
The Starlink 6-96 mission added another 29 broadband internet satellites to the low Earth orbit constellation. SpaceX launched from Space Launch Complex 40 on Friday, Jan. 9, at 4:41 p.m. EST (2141 UTC).

NASA weighs an earlier end to the Crew-11 mission after a ‘medical situation’ with an ISS crew member postpones first spacewalk of 2026
U.S. spacewalk 94 was slated to have NASA astronauts Mike Fincke and Zena Cardman perform a variety of operations around the orbiting outpost during the roughly 6.5-hour-long event. A new date for the spacewalk hasn’t been announced.