NASA astronauts complete installation of second solar panel on ISS in stunning spacewalk

National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) astronaut Shane Kimbrough and European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Thomas Pesquet were seen spacewalking outside the International Space Station (ISS) to install and deploy the second of two new ISS Roll-Out Solar Arrays (iROSA). In footage shared by NASA on its official Twitter handle, Pesquet who is an extravehicular crew member 1 (EV 1) and extravehicular crew member 2 (EV 2) Kimbrough were both attired in their spacesuits as they sailed 255 miles (410 kilometres) above Earth in space to battery power at 7:52 a.m. EDT that lasted for about six and a half hours.

This was the fifth spacewalk for the two astronauts who have been assigned with the task of installing the new solar arrays on ISS in order to maintain sufficient power supply for NASA’s exploration technology demonstrations for lunar mission Artemis.

During Expedition 50, both Pesquet and Kimbrough had conducted at least two spacewalks in January and March 2017 in a separate station power upgrade that needed nickel-hydrogen batteries upgrading with the new lithium-ion batteries. According to the LIVE video aired on NASA TV, astronaut Megan McArthur commanded the Remote Manipulator System (Canadarm2) as Pesquet attached to manoeuvre the array closer to the installation location on the far end of the left (port) side of the station’s backbone truss structure (P6) to upgrade the 4B power channel. 

The 57.7-foot-long robotic arm Canadarm2 performs station maintenance, moves supplies, equipment, Dextre, and even astronauts, as well as performs "cosmic catches” by berthing the spacecraft to the ISS. The Canadarm2 is “commanded” to move around the ISS as it carries out various tasks. The anchoring end of the robotic arm has to be secured to a power data grapple fixture for it to walk end-over-end around the ISS.

NASA’s  241st spacewalk

This would be NASA’s  241st spacewalk overall for the space station assembly. The first set of solar panels approximately 63 feet (19 meters) in length was installed last week by the astronauts. Pesquet and Kimbrough had at the time removed and stowed the hardware to release the second iROSA from its flight support structure to be installed on the P6 truss’ 4B power channel later.