Tag: spacewalk

Chinese Spacewalkers Install Space-Junk Shielding on Tiangong Space Station

SPACE reports, “Two Chinese astronauts continued installing space debris protection outside the nation’s Tiangong space station” during a July 3 EVA. “Ye Guangfu and Li Cong, two members of the three-person Shenzhou 18 mission, spent about 6.5 hours working outside Tiangong on Wednesday (July 3). Li Guangsu assisted the expedition from inside Tiangong, operating the station’s robotic arm.”
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NASA’s Two Stuck Astronauts Perform Their First Spacewalk Together

AP News reports, “NASA’s two stuck astronauts took their first spacewalk together Thursday, exiting the International Space Station almost eight months after moving in. Commander Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore floated out to perform maintenance work and wipe the station’s exterior for evidence of any microbes that might still be alive after launching from Earth and escaping through vents.”
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Cosmonauts Find Radiator Coolant Leak on ISS During Spacewalk

Spaceflight Now reports that two Russian spacewalkers “floated outside the International Space Station Wednesday and isolated a leaking radiator as planned, apparently causing residual coolant still trapped inside to make its way to the leak site and spew out into space.” Cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko “planned to sop up the pooling coolant with a cloth towel, but was told to leave the area immediately when he reported some of the liquid had made it onto a safety tether.” The tether “was secured in a bag and procedures were already in place to make sure the cosmonauts’ spacesuits were clear of any such contamination before they re-entered the space station at the end of the spacewalk.” In the meantime, Kononenko and crewmate Nikolai Chub “pressed ahead with work to attach a small synthetic aperture radar antenna to the hull of the Nauka module.” One of its four panels “failed to fully deploy and lock in place, and officials said adjustments would be made in a future spacewalk.” Finally, Kononenko and Chub “released a small student-built ‘nanosatellite,’ but the solar sail propulsion system it was designed to test failed to deploy.” After making a final attempt “to coax the balky radar panel into place, the cosmonauts called it a day.”
Full Story (Spaceflight Now)

NASA Postpones Spacewalk Due to Coolant Leak from Russian ISS Module

SPACE reports NASA officials have postponed a planned spacewalk from the ISS “as a precautionary measure after a leak of ammonia coolant was spotted Monday (Oct. 9) in a backup radiator on the Russian Nauka science module. Another spacewalk on Oct. 20 is also postponed and new dates will be announced shortly, NASA officials stated.”
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Tool Bag Dropped During ISS Spacewalk

CNN reports that NASA astronauts Jasmin Moghbeli and Loral O’Hara “marked their first spacewalk this month with a tool bag floating through space.” The pair “concluded their maintenance work outside the International Space Station (ISS) in six hours and 42 minutes, according to the space agency.” The spacewalk on November 1 “saw Moghbeli and O’Hara complete works on the station’s solar arrays, which track the sun, but they ran out of time to remove and stow a communications electronics box.” Leaving this task “for a future spacewalk, the pair instead conducted an assessment of how the job could be done.” During the mission, a tool bag “gave them the slip and was ‘lost,’ NASA said, with flight controllers spotting it using the ISS’ external cameras.” Fortunately, the tools “were not required for the remainder of their tasks.” According to EarthSky, “a website tracking cosmic events, the tool bag is currently orbiting Earth ahead of the ISS, and can potentially be spotted from Earth with a pair of binoculars during the next few months until it disintegrates in our planet’s atmosphere.”
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Astronauts Install Hardware on Outside of ISS

CNN reports, “First-time spacewalkers and NASA astronauts Josh Cassada and Frank Rubio began their excursion outside the space station at 9:14 a.m. ET and ended at 4:25 p.m. ET, lasting for 7 hours and 11 minutes.” The purpose of the excursion was to assemble a mounting bracket on the space station’s starboard side, which will allow for more rollout solar arrays (iROSAs), which will increase the power to the space station. “The first two rollout solar arrays were installed outside the station in June 2021. Six iROSAs total have been planned and will likely boost the space station’s power generation by more than 30% once all are operational.”
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Russian Cosmonauts Conduct Second Spacewalk

CNN reports that cosmonauts Oleg Novitskiy and Pyotr Dubrov “conducted their second spacewalk in less than a week as they continue configurations for the new Nauka module for operations on the International Space Station.” The spacewalk was conducted Thursday despite a fire alarm going off on Wednesday night. Novitskiy and Dubrov installed handrails and routed cables left unfinished by last week’s spacewalk.
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Spacewalk to Install ISS Solar Arrays Scheduled for Friday

CBS News reports that French astronaut Thomas Pesquet and NASA astronaut Shane Kimbrough are scheduled to conduct a spacewalk from the International Space Station on Friday. The goal of the spacewalk, scheduled to begin at 8 a.m. EDT, is to install the second ISS Roll-Out Solar Arrays (iROSAs). NASA “plans to install iROSA panels on six of the space station’s eight original solar wings, all of which have suffered age-related degradation, including rocket plume deposits from visiting cargo and crew ships and impacts from micrometeoroids.”
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NASA Astronauts to Conduct Spacewalk Thursday After Delay Due to Space Debris

SPACE reports that NASA astronauts Thomas Marshburn and Kayla Barron “will conduct a spacewalk previously scheduled for Tuesday (Nov. 30) on Thursday (Dec. 2) after the agency evaluated the risks posed by space debris.” NASA officials wrote, “NASA determined the orbit of the debris does not pose a risk to a scheduled spacewalk by Thomas Marshburn and Kayla Barron or to International Space Station operations. Delaying the spacewalk provided an opportunity for NASA to evaluate the risk from the debris notification.”
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NASA Astronauts Perform 5th All-Female Spacewalk Outside International Space Station

AP News reports, “An astronaut who missed out on the first all-female spacewalk because of a spacesuit sizing issue got her chance six years later on Thursday. NASA’s Anne McClain emerged from the International Space Station alongside Nichole Ayers. Both military officers and pilots, they launched to the orbiting lab in March to replace NASA’s two stuck astronauts, who are now back home.”
Full Story (AP News)