NASA astronaut Drew Feustel, shown during a spacewalk at the International Space Station March 29, 2018, is scheduled to conduct the 10th spacewalk of his career Sept. 23, 2018, during which he is expected to break the record for total time spacewalking by a U.S. astronaut. Credits: NASA
International Space Station (ISS) Commander Drew Feustel (USA) and Flight Engineers Alexander Gerst (European Space Agency) and Ricky Arnold (USA) will conduct spacewalks on Sunday, September 23, and Saturday, September 29, 2018. These will be the 213th and 214th spacewalks at the ISS. You can watch them LIVE on the NASA TV portal below. There will also be a briefing on the spacewalks covered live on NASA TV on Tuesday, September 18, from NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.
Click on the image above for a stunning high resolution view from space.
All three spacewalking astronauts are on Twitter, with real time updates from ISS. You can view the combined Twitter feed of all 5 astronauts currently tweeting from ISS using the “Astros Tweeting from ISS” widget in the right column, or on Twitter.
The NASA Media Advisory on the spacewalks, with live coverage details, is below.
September 11, 2018
MEDIA ADVISORY M18-137
NASA to Preview Two International Space Station Spacewalks, Provide Live Coverage
Astronauts on the International Space Station will conduct spacewalks Sept. 23 and 29 to continue upgrades to the orbiting laboratory’s power system. Experts from NASA will preview this work in a briefing at 2 p.m. EDT Tuesday, Sept. 18, at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.
Live coverage of the briefing and spacewalks will air on NASA Television and the agency’s website. Media wishing to participate in the briefing in person must request credentials from the Johnson newsroom no later than 4 p.m. Monday, Sept. 17. Media interested in participating by phone must contact the newsroom by 1:45 p.m. Sept. 18.
Participants in the briefing are:
Kenneth Todd, International Space Station manager for Operations and Integration
Mary Lawrence, spacewalk flight director
Jaclyn Kagey, lead spacewalk officer
Troy McCracken, spacewalk robotics officer
The equipment to be installed will be delivered on a Japanese H-II Transfer Vehicle cargo craft. The installation work will begin on Earth, when ground controllers use the station’s robotic arm to replace old nickel-hydrogen batteries on the port truss of the complex with six new lithium-ion batteries.
Station Commander Drew Feustel of NASA and Flight Engineer Alexander Gerst of ESA (European Space Agency) will venture outside the Quest airlock Sunday, Sept. 23 to install the adapter plates for the new batteries, completing the upgrades to two station power channels.
With this spacewalk, the 10th of his career, Feustel will tie former astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria for most spacewalks by a U.S. astronaut, and is expected to surpass him for overall spacewalking time to become the all-time leading U.S. spacewalker and second overall in spaceflight history. It will be Gerst’s second spacewalk.
Six days later, on Saturday, Sept. 29, NASA Flight Engineer Ricky Arnold will join Gerst to complete the power system refurbishment on the port truss. It will be Arnold’s sixth spacewalk.
Coverage of the spacewalks will begin on NASA TV and the agency’s website at 6:30 a.m., with both spacewalks scheduled to begin around 8 a.m. and last about six-and-a-half hours. These spacewalks will be the 213th and 214th in support of station assembly, maintenance and upgrades; and the eighth and ninth outside the station this year.
Learn more about International Space Station research, operations, and its crew at:
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WATCH SPACEWALKS LIVE ON THIS NASA TV PORTAL
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/#.Ux37dCjn1sQ
The Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP) is a program of the National Center for Earth and Space Science Education (NCESSE) in the U.S., and the Arthur C. Clarke Institute for Space Education internationally. It is enabled through a strategic partnership with DreamUp PBC and NanoRacks LLC, which are working with NASA under a Space Act Agreement as part of the utilization of the International Space Station as a National Laboratory. SSEP is the first pre-college STEM education program that is both a U.S. national initiative and implemented as an on-orbit commercial space venture.
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