NASA astronauts, Victor Glover Jr. and Mike Hopkins, have recently conducted a spacewalk. This activity was undertaken to complete the battery upgradation process and install high-definition cameras outside the ISS (International Space Station).
The astronauts started the spacewalk at 7:56 am ET and ended at 1:16 pm ET. This marks the 2nd spacewalk of the duo in a matter of days. Moreover, this was the 234th spacewalk to support the upgrades, assembly, and maintenance of the space station. During the process, they quickly went through other lists of tasks and accomplished a few get-ahead items planned for future spacewalks.
Mike Hopkins wore a spacesuit with red stripes as the crew member 1, while Victor Glover Jr. wore a spacesuit designed with no stripes as the crew member 2. They installed the final li-ion battery adapter plate and connected the plate to the battery. The battery was robotically installed prior to the recent spacewalk, resulting in the completed replacement of the aging nickel-hydrogen batteries that were installed in January 2017. The new Li-ion batteries are reportedly more efficient and can deliver improved power capacity to the space station.
Following the installation of the batteries, the two astronauts moved to the opposite side of the ISS to work on other upgrades, which included the replacement of an external standard camera with a high-definition camera as well as the camera & light assembly components required for the camera system of Japanese robotic arm.
In mid-November 2020, Hopkins, Glover, Soichi Noguchi (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut), and Shannon Walker (NASA astronaut) were launched into the ISS aboard the SpaceX Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft. There are several other spacewalks planned for the crew members by February end or the beginning of March. For example, NASA astronaut Kate Rubins and Glover will pair up for the 3rd spacewalk to prepare the power system of the station for the installation of new solar arrays to boost its power supply.
Source credit:
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/02/01/us/nasa-spacewalk-2021-february-scn-trnd/index.html
