Expedition 67 commander Oleg Artemyev and flight engineer Denis Matveev easily exceeded their assigned tasks during a 7-hour, 47-minute spacewalk aboard the International Space Station that began at 9:25 a.m. EDT (1325 GMT). “You accomplished more than you planned to do! Very productive,” a Moscow mission representative told the cosmonauts as they closed the hatch. (The broadcast was in Russian, interpretation was available in English on NASA TV.) Working up to an hour, 10 minutes ahead of schedule, Artemyev and Matveev completed several tasks to configure the European Robotic Arm and completed a preparation task to extend the long Strela crane between the Poisk and FGB units on the rotating assembly. Russian side. “These rifts have a lot of inertia,” commented one of the spacewalkers in mid-expansion. In Pictures: The Most Memorable Spacewalks in History Artemyev and Matveev had to return to the airlock early on August 17 after one of the Orlan spacesuits experienced a battery problem. (NASA did not disclose how Roscosmos evaluated the issue or decided to proceed with spacewalks; the spacesuits had no power problems this time.) The rest of the work was quickly completed on today’s excursion, including installing a work platform on the Nauka unit, configuring a control panel and arm “end effector” and maneuvering some insulation between sites, among other tasks. In addition to extending the arm, a key spacewalk goal was achieved when the spacewalkers successfully tested a mechanism intended to help the arm grip a payload of more than nine tons in space. The astronauts also had a few moments to take in the sights of Earth, including witnessing devastating wildfires and smoke over California. “You can see these forest fires. That’s impressive,” one of the spacewalkers commented shortly before 11:20 a.m. EDT (1520 GMT), during the second hour of non-vehicular activity. On their previous outing on August 17, lasting 2.5 hours, the duo completed enough work for European controllers to make the first hand motion on August 24. “This first move involved releasing 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 repositioning it in its original position,” officials said. European Space Agency. (opens in a new tab). (Nauka is the Russian unit with which the arm was launched into space in July 2021.) The arm moved a payload about the size of a small suitcase during testing, but when fully ready it will be able to carry payloads with a mass of nearly 9 tonnes. Testers plan a more ambitious arm test in mid-September to evaluate brakes, joint movement, force control and camera image quality. Friday’s spacewalk was the eighth spacewalk for Artemyev and the fourth for Matveev, NASA said. It was also the eighth on the ISS in 2022 and the 253rd to support its assembly and maintenance since 1998, based on data from previous spacewalks. Follow Elizabeth Howell on Twitter @howellspace (opens in new tab). Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom (opens in a new tab) or Facebook (opens in a new tab).
