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May 18, 2009

US Astronauts on Final Spacewalk for Hubble Repairs
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Final spacewalk to last up to 6 hours, replace Hubble batteries, sensor,
insulation 
NASA TV image of astronaut John Grunsfeld putting on foot restraints to
upgrade the Hubble telescope, 18 May 2009U.S. astronauts are undertaking
their fifth and final spacewalk Monday to repair the Hubble Space
Telescope. Spacewalkers John Grunsfeld and Andrew Feustel left the
Atlantis space shuttle at 1220 UTC (8:20 am EST) to begin the nearly six
hour operation. So far, the two have successfully installed a fresh set
of three - 57 kilogram batteries, leaving plenty of time to replace the
telescope's sensor and insulation. The insulation was to have been
replaced Sunday. However, the astronauts experienced technical
difficulties and were unable to complete the installation. Mission
planners decided to add the task to Monday's list of things to do. NASA
is hoping the repairs will extend the life of the telescope by at least
another five years. The Hubble is expected to be released on Tuesday. On
Sunday, astronauts Mike Good and Mike Massimino replaced the power
supply unit for the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph, a powerful
instrument that allows NASA to identify black holes and to monitor
galaxies. The two spacewalkers on Sunday had trouble unbolting a
handrail that had to be removed in order to start their repairs. While
they were not able to loosen one of the handrail's bolts, they were able
to bend it out of the way and proceed with their work. Their spacewalk
lasted more than eight hours. It was the sixth-longest spacewalk in the
history of the U.S. space program. The mission to Hubble is more
dangerous than other missions because the telescope is sharing an orbit
with debris left behind by satellite collisions and rocket launches. The
astronauts are further challenged because they can only work with the
supplies they are able to carry with them on the shuttle. In missions to
the International Space Station, astronauts have enough supplies on the
station to last up to three months. 

Some information for this report was provided by AFP and AP.


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