NEW YORK, September 5 (Itar-Tass) —— Sunita Williams of the U.S. and Akihido Hoshide of Japan will go on a spacewalk from the International Space Station (ISS) on Wednesday to repair an electric power switch on the ISS exterior. The spacewalk will begin at about 7:15 a.m. Eastern time (3:15 p.m. Moscow time), NASA said.
The astronauts failed to accomplish their mission during the previous spacewalk on Thursday. They spent more than eight hours outside of the station, two hours more than planned, but failed to replace one of the four switches. NASA said problems occurred in the removal of the old switch. The astronauts unscrewed two bolts with difficulty but found steel chips inside. They could not fasten bolts of the new switch although the steel chips were removed with compressed gas.
Only five of eight electric power lines are operational now, but that has an insignificant effect on the ISS. The American segment had to disconnect the treadmill. The new spacewalk will normalize power supply.
Other members of the ISS crew are Gennady Padalka, Yuri Malenchenko and Sergei Revin of Russia, and Joseph Acaba of the U.S. Williams is the only woman aboard. She came to the ISS in July jointly with the Japanese astronaut aboard a Soyuz spaceship launched from Baikonur.