✓ Link copied to clipboard! A NASA astronaut was hospitalized with an undisclosed medical issue after returning from a stay on the International Space Station (ISS) that unexpectedly lasted nearly eight months, the agency said on Friday. He was released the following day. "After an overnight stay at Ascension Sacred Heart Pensacola in Florida, the NASA astronaut was released and returned to NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston Saturday," NASA said in a statement. Three NASA astronauts and one Russian cosmonaut landed in the Gulf of Mexico in the early hours of Friday. The four astronauts had routine medical checks on the recovery ship before being flown to a hospital in Pensacola, Florida, for further evaluation. NASA said the hospital trip for the four-person crew was done "out of an abundance of caution." However, the space agency said one astronaut, who was not identified, remained at the hospital on Friday "as a precautional measure" but was in stable condition. "To protect the crew member's medical privacy, specific details on the individual's condition or identity will not be shared," NASA said in a statement. This photo provided by NASA shows Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin, left, NASA astronauts Michael Barratt, second from left, Matthew Dominick, second from right, and Jeanette Epps, right, inside the SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft onboard the... This photo provided by NASA shows Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin, left, NASA astronauts Michael Barratt, second from left, Matthew Dominick, second from right, and Jeanette Epps, right, inside the SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft onboard the SpaceX recovery ship MEGAN shortly after having landed in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Pensacola, Florida, on October 25, 2024. One member of the crew remained hospitalized on Friday after their return from space. More Why Were the Astronauts Stranded in Space? The returned crew—NASA astronauts Matthew Dominick, Michael Barratt and Jeanette Epps, along with Russian cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin—were initially launched by SpaceX on behalf of NASA in March and expected to spend six months on ISS. However, the crew's return was repeatedly postponed. First, Boeing's Starliner, which was intended as a secondary astronaut transport option, returned to Earth without Crew-8 in September due to thruster and helium leak issues. Then, Hurricane Milton further delayed the crew's return when it tore through Florida at the beginning of the month. Barratt, who was the only space veteran going into the mission, said the team had to "replan, retool and kind of redo everything right along with us," adding the support team back home "helped us to roll with all those punches." When Did the Astronauts Return to Earth? The astronauts returned home on a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft, named Endeavour, which undocked from the International Space Station on Wednesday at 5:05 p.m. ET. The Dragon capsule made its splashdown at 3:39 a.m. ET on Friday. "Splashdown. Welcome home, #Crew8! After a science mission of over seven months living and working on the Space Station, the crew of four are back on Earth," NASA said in a post on X (formerly Twitter). What's Next for the Space Station? While the four members of Crew-8 returned home on Friday, two test pilots for Boeing's Starliner spacecraft that arrived at ISS in June will remain at the station until early next year. Those NASA astronauts—Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore—were only supposed to be away from Earth for about a week, but they are now expected to have their own eight-month stay in space. The pair will remain on ISS until at least February​, along with two new crew members Nick Hague and Aleksandr Gorbunov, who were launched by SpaceX in late September, as well as NASA's Donald Pettit Donald R. Pettit, who arrived with Roscosmos cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner on September 11. Update 10/28/24 9:40 a.m. ET: This story has been updated to report the NASA astronaut has been released from the hospital after an overnight stay. \ \ Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground. \ \ \ ';uncommonKnowledgeItems[0].insertAdjacentHTML('afterend',uncommonKnowledgeContainerHtml);let uncommonKnowledgeContainerElement=document.getElementsByClassName('uncommon-knowledge');let itemsContainerElement=document.getElementById('uncommon-knowledge-items-container');uncommonKnowledgeContainerElement[0].style.display='block';uncommonKnowledgeItems.forEach((itemUncommon)=>{document.getElementById('uncommon-knowledge-items-container').insertAdjacentHTML('beforeend','