Cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov and Pyotr Dubrov concluded a crucial spacewalk, installing necessary equipment on the Prichal module to support future spacecraft docking.
Russian cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov and Pyotr Dubrov of Roscosmos concluded their spacewalk at 2:28 p.m. EST yesterday after 7 hours and 11 minutes.
Shkaplerov and Dubrov completed their major objectives for the day to ready the new Prichal module for future Russian visiting spacecraft. The cosmonauts installed handrails, rendezvous antennas, a television camera, and docking targets on Prichal, which automatically docked to the Nauka multipurpose laboratory module in November.
This was the first spacewalk this year and the 246th overall in support of space station assembly, maintenance, and upgrades. Spacewalkers have now spent a total of 64 days, 19 hours, and 37 minutes working outside the station.
This was the third spacewalk in Shkaplerov’s career, who has now spent a total of 21 hours and 39 minutes spacewalking, and the fourth for Dubrov, bringing his total to 29 hours and 49 minutes of spacewalk time.
Additional spacewalks are planned this spring to outfit a European robotic arm on the Nauka laboratory and to activate Nauka’s airlock for future spacewalk activity.
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