Sad Holiday for Space Station Astronaut

The upcoming holidays will be bittersweet for orbiting astronaut Daniel Tani. Yesterday, Tani's mother was killed in a collision between the vehicle she was driving and a moving train in Tani's hometown of Lombard, Ill., according to a report from the Associated Press. Tani was supposed to have returned to Earth this week with the crew of shuttle mission STS-122, in time to celebrate the holidays with his family, but faulty sensors in the external fuel tank caused NASA to postpone the flight until next month (see our prior entry "Glitch Grounds Space Shuttle for Weeks").

Rose Tani, 90, of Lombard, near Chicago, died from injuries suffered after she attempted to pass a school bus that had stopped at a railroad crossing to wait for the train to pass. A local ABC News affiliate, WLS-TV, reported that the crossing gates had apparently not closed in time to prevent the accident. Tani was informed by a flight surgeon at NASA's mission control shortly after it received the news.

"We'll do everything we can to help him through a very difficult timeframe," said Eileen Hawley, a spokeswoman for NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

The 46-year-old Tani is nearing the end of his second mission in space. He previously flew aboard mission STS-108, in the Endeavour shuttle, to the International Space Station (ISS) in December of 2001, where he performed his first spacewalk. As a member of STS-120 and ISS Expeditions 15 and 16, Tani has performed numerous spacewalks to help with construction work on the orbiting science platform. He has been in space since 23 October of this year.

Tani is married to the former Jane Egan, of Cork, Ireland, and has two small children, ages 3 and 1. His father is also deceased.

"He is obviously pretty sad," the astronaut's brother, Richard Tani, said in Thursday's edition of the Chicago Sun-Times. "He was pretty close to her. We are all close to her. She was loved by everyone."

NASA said Tani's duties will be reassigned to his current crewmates, station commander Peggy Whitson and cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko.

"Before anyone launches, they understand that unfortunate things could happen and that's unfortunately part of the difficulties, hardships and risks of space flight," NASA spokesman Jim Rostohar said in an article today in the Chicago Tribune.

Tani is believed to be the first American astronaut to lose a close family member while in space, NASA spokeswoman Nicole Cloutier said.

Our condolences go out to the members of the Tani family on their loss, especially at this time.