Astronauts set for spacewalk: Starliner crew staying at ISS longer

A pair of NASA astronauts are scheduled to do a 6.5 hour spacewalk on the morning of June 13 outdoors the Worldwide House Station.

At 8 a.m. Jap time, astronauts Tracy C. Dyson and Matthew Dominick are anticipated to enter the vacuum of space to carry out station upkeep and science work.

NASA stated the 2 will take away some communications equipment from one of many ISS’ laboratory modules, getting assist from a robotic arm on the station. Astronauts Mike Barratt and Jeanette Epps will probably be maneuvering the Canadarm2 to help Dyson and Dominick of their work.

Then, Dyson and Dominick will transfer on to a science experiment involving microorganisms. They are going to swab surfaces on the ISS to “decide if microorganisms launched via station vents can survive the exterior microgravity setting,” NASA stated in a press release.

NASA TV will start its spacewalk broadcast at 6:30 a.m. Thursday. Stay protection will air on NASA+, NASA Tv, the NASA app, YouTube, and the company’s web site.

Amongst these watching the spacewalk up shut will probably be Butch Whitmore and Suni Williams, the crew of the Boeing Starliner which launched from the Kennedy House Middle on June 5 en path to the ISS.

Whitmore and Williams realized Tuesday that they are going to be spending extra time on the space station than initially deliberate.

“Floor groups proceed to evaluate and monitor Starliner’s efficiency and planning for return of the mission no sooner than Tuesday, June 18, pending climate and spacecraft readiness,” NASA stated.

The space company additionally stated its groups are persevering with to entry what impacts, if any, 5 small helium leaks aboard the Starliner spacecraft would have on Whitmore’s and Williams’ return to Earth.

“Engineers evaluated the helium provide based mostly on present leak charges and decided that Starliner has loads of margin to help the return journey from station,” NASA stated. “Solely seven hours of free-flight time is required to carry out a standard finish of mission, and Starliner at the moment has sufficient helium left in its tanks to help 70 hours of free flight exercise following undocking.”

Whereas Starliner is docked on the ISS, methods involving the helium leaks have been turned off, stopping additional helium loss from the tanks.

As soon as cleared to return to house, NASA stated the Starliner with Wilmore and Williams aboard, “will carry out a deorbit burn earlier than getting into the environment and touchdown within the southwestern United States underneath parachutes and touchdown airbags to finish the flight.”

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