Posted on 02/05/2018 10:44:26 AM PST by BenLurkin
A record-setting Russian spacewalk ended with a critical antenna in the wrong position Friday outside the International Space Station.
NASA’s Mission Control reported that the antenna was still working. Nevertheless, Russian space officials were convening a special team to see whether further action would be necessary. The antenna is used for communications with Russia’s Mission Control outside Moscow.
The trouble arose toward the end of the more than 8-hour spacewalk — the longest ever by Russians and the fifth longest overall — after Commander Alexander Misurkin and Anton Shkaplerov successfully replaced an electronics box to upgrade the antenna.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Wrong Way Ivan
The trouble arose toward the end of the more than 8-hour spacewalk — the longest ever by Russians and the fifth longest overall — after Commander Alexander Misurkin and Anton Shkaplerov successfully replaced an electronics box to upgrade the antenna.
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Must have been the AE-35 unit.
Dave, I still believe the antenna is going to fail.
Open the pod bay doors, HAL.
Moscow, we have a problem.
“After removing the old, obsolete electronics box from the antenna — an original part, launched in 2000 — Misurkin shoved it away from the space station....”
“The 60-pound box — measuring just a couple of feet, or less than a meter — was hurled in a direction that will not intersect with the space station, according to NASA officials.”
” ...The discarded electronics box will re-enter and burn up, too; Mission Control said it did not know when that will occur.”
Why not make the repair in 2 shorter duration space walks so that at a time critical to success the astronauts aren’t exhausted after being “outside” so long? What’s the point in a long space walk if it just ends in failure?
Also, seems stupid to just toss trash out into space... especially electronics.. would there be value to studying the way electronics degrade over time in a space environment? Maybe they already know all that...and I’m the ignorant one, which is completely possible.
"It looks good to me. Now I am hero."
Well at least Russia currently has a manned space program, unlike us. We’ll see how far we get with this Project Orion or whatever it’s called, that looks a hell of a lot like the Apollo program.
THANKS, OBAMA!!
Space X is also developing a spacecraft for NASA to shuttle our astronauts without the help of the Russians. If we want to improve our space program then we have to do a better job of selling its importance to Americans, congressmen won’t consider funding anything that doesn’t make them popular back home. My hunch is many Americans don’t see much value in NASA or space exploration especially after Obama mothballed it for 8 years for “muslim outreach”
It doesn’t help that we haven’t had an official budget since 0 entered the WH...
Rubber mallets to be banned...
Now they can only get Channel 63 from Saginaw, and then only when the wind is blowing in the right direction.
An excellent point.
Ooopski. My bad-onov.
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