Lombard astronaut Tani working through grief by keeping busy

Dick Tani's phone rang a lot Wednesday.

There were the usual consolations from friends about the sudden death of his mother, Rose, in an accident that afternoon.

His most frequent caller, though, was Dan, his little brother, an astronaut stuck in orbit 220 miles above Earth while his family grieves the death of its matriarch.

"I talked to him about three times. He talked to (his sister) Christine. He talked to my nephew," Dick said Thursday.

"Dan's obviously sad that he can't be here, but he's talked to the whole family."

By radio from the International Space Station, Dan Tani said Thursday he might as well proceed with his work.

"I'm up and awake, and I've got the time today, so I'm happy to help out and do what I can today," he said. "I'm here, and actually I'm eager to get the science done. It's good to be working today."

Rose Tani, 90, a woman who raised five children alone after her husband's death, died Wednesday when she drove her car around a school bus stopped at a Lombard rail crossing. It put her directly into the path of an oncoming freight train unable to stop in time to avoid her.

"We've got no idea where she was going, or what she was doing," Dick said, adding they planned to check Rose's calendar to see if she had any appointments.

The sheer impatience of the act was difficult to fathom for those who knew her, a meticulous, thoughtful woman.

"She was so careful," Dick said.

As family and friends planned a memorial service for Rose on Sunday, questions automatically arose about whether they'd be able to connect Dan live to the service. While NASA has the technological capacity, Dick said the family has chosen not to go to extraordinary measures.

They'll be taping the service for NASA to transmit to him somehow. And Dan will be sending his own video contribution to include.

Science experiments kept the 46-year-old astronaut busy Thursday. Though NASA officials said they're willing to work around his need for time off to grieve, he asked to keep busy and remain on task.

It's a heartbreaking situation no other American astronaut has experienced. And it's made worse by the fact NASA has no time frame for his return.

When he departed in October he was scheduled to return this month, this week in fact, on the shuttle Atlantis. Ongoing problems with gauges for the external fuel tanks, though, delayed that launch twice, and at best it can't launch until Jan. 10.

A Russian Soyuz spacecraft docked at the space station must be reserved in case the two Americans and one Russian aboard need to evacuate the outpost in an emergency.

"It's a unique situation to be in orbit, without a ride home maybe, for a long time and something this tragic happens in your family," said the Rev. Rob Hatfield, a minister at the family's church.

NASA prepares for all sorts of contingencies, and bad news from home is one of them. All astronauts are asked whether they would want to know about family emergencies right away or whether that information should be held back if they are preparing for an intense task such as a spacewalk, said Dr. Sean Roden, Dan's flight surgeon.

He, like nearly all his colleagues, opted to know immediately, Roden said. Many have said they wouldn't want their family to go through the grief alone, he said.

While no other U.S. astronaut has lost a close relative in space, several had to be told about accidents or major illnesses involving family, said Dr. Smith Johnston, a NASA flight surgeon.

Every astronaut is assigned a psychological support group to help prepare for the anxieties of spaceflight, including missing family events big and small, said astronaut Clayton Anderson, Dan's predecessor aboard the space station. When asked who he chose to notify him of a tragedy on Earth, Anderson chose his wife.

NASA's flight surgeon and Dan's wife, Jane, delivered the news Wednesday.

"I can only imagine what he's going through and how difficult a time it is for him," said Anderson, whose own mother died a week ago.

One person who does understand is cosmonaut Georgy Grechko, who was less than a month into his 96-day voyage aboard the Soviet space station Salyut 6 in 1978 when his father died. The Soviets decided not to tell him until the day after he landed -- more than two months later.

It was the secretive Soviet era, when personal lives were subordinate to the needs of the state.

"I must admit that this news would have put me out of working form. I would have been half in space and half on Earth, beside my father's grave," Grechko, now 76, said Thursday. "So I guess I must acknowledge that while it seems inhumane, it was probably the right decision."

The Soviets even sent him letters from his father after his death, via supply ships.

He said he asked to speak to his father upon returning to Earth but was told repeatedly that it was impossible to get through. He was finally told the truth only after he announced he would go to the nearest post office and use the phone there.

Nowadays, family, friends and counselors are just a call away on a private Internet phone line astronauts are allowed to use throughout their mission, NASA said.

Dick Tani said that access seems to be helping his brother so far.