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Two cosmonauts bounced again into motion Friday (Sept. 2), greater than making up for a spacewalk lower brief two weeks in the past.
Expedition 67 commander Oleg Artemyev and flight engineer Denis Matveev simply exceeded their assigned spacewalk duties throughout a 7 hour, 47 minute International Space Station spacewalk that started at 9:25 a.m. EDT (1325 GMT).
“You completed more than you set out to do! Very productive,” a consultant from Moscow Mission Control advised the cosmonauts simply after they closed the hatch. (The transmission was in Russian; interpretation was out there in English on NASA Television.)
Working as a lot as one hour, 10 minutes forward of timeline, Artemyev and Matveev completed quite a few duties to configure the European Robotic Arm, and completed a get-ahead job to increase the lengthy Strela growth crane between the Poisk and FGB modules on the orbiting advanced’s Russian facet.
“These booms have a lot of inertia,” one of many spacewalkers commented mid-extension.
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Artemyev and Matveev needed to head back to the airlock early on Aug. 17 after one of many Orlan spacesuits skilled a battery downside. (NASA didn’t disclose how Roscosmos assessed the difficulty or determined to proceed with spacewalks; the spacesuits had no energy issues this time round.)
The ticked via remaining duties rapidly on right this moment’s tour, together with putting in a piece platform on the Nauka module, configuring a management panel and the arm’s greedy “end effector”, and maneuvering some insulation between areas, amongst different duties.
Besides the growth extension, a key spacewalk goal was met when the spacewalkers efficiently examined a mechanism meant to assist the arm grasp payloads of greater than 9 tons in space.
The cosmonauts additionally had just a few moments to absorb the view of Earth, together with witnessing devastating wildfires and smoke over California. “You can see those forest fires. That is impressive,” one of many spacewalkers commented shortly earlier than 11:20 a.m. EDT (1520 GMT), in the course of the extra-vehicular exercise’s second hour.
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On their earlier tour on Aug. 17, lasting 2.5 hours, the duo did full sufficient work on for European controllers to do first movement on the arm on Aug. 24.
“This first motion involved unleashing the payload — a single pin latch and its adapter for the cosmonaut support tool — from Nauka, moving it to the other side of the module and then installing it back to the original position,” European Space Agency officers stated (opens in new tab). (Nauka is the Russian module that the arm launched to space with in July 2021.)
The arm moved a payload concerning the measurement of a small suitcase in the course of the check, however when absolutely prepared it will likely be capable of heft payloads with a mass of almost 9 tons. Controllers plan a extra formidable arm check in mid-September to evaluate the brakes, joint movement, power management and digicam picture high quality.
Friday’s spacewalk was the eighth spacewalk for Artemyev and the fourth for Matveev, NASA acknowledged. It additionally was the eighth on the ISS in 2022 and the 253rd supporting its meeting and upkeep since 1998, based mostly on knowledge from previous spacewalks.
Follow Elizabeth Howell on Twitter @howellspace (opens in new tab). Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom (opens in new tab) or Facebook (opens in new tab).
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