The Expedition 74 crew is gearing up for the primary spacewalk of 2026 this week that may see two astronauts put together the Worldwide House Station for a brand new set of roll-out photo voltaic arrays. The orbital residents additionally had time on Monday to conduct microgravity analysis, pack a U.S. cargo craft, and keep communications and life assist techniques.
NASA astronauts Mike Fincke and Zena Cardman are scheduled to exit the orbital outpost’s Quest airlock at 8 a.m. EST on Thursday for a six-and-a-half-hour spacewalk. The duo will set up a modification equipment and route cables organising the station’s port facet truss construction for a brand new roll-out photo voltaic array that can be delivered on an upcoming cargo mission. Different duties embrace putting in jumper cables, photographing station {hardware}, and swabbing exterior station surfaces to gather potential microorganism samples. Managers will preview Thursday’s spacewalk and a second spacewalk scheduled for Jan. 15 on NASA’s YouTube channel starting at 2 p.m. on Tuesday.
Fincke and Cardman have been joined by Chris Williams of NASA and Kimiya Yui of JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Company) on Monday reviewing Thursday’s spacewalk procedures and confirming their readiness with mission controllers on the bottom. Williams and Yui will help the duo out and in of their spacesuits, pressurize and depressurize the Quest airlock, and monitor the spacewalkers as they work on their duties within the exterior surroundings of house. Fincke and Cardman additionally checked out their spacesuit emergency jetpacks that allow a spacewalker to soundly maneuver again to the orbital outpost within the unlikely occasion they develop into untethered.
Yui and Williams additionally partnered collectively on the finish of the day on Monday putting in cassettes containing protein crystal samples contained in the Superior Pattern Experiment Processor-4 and photographing the analysis actions. The science work befell within the Future laboratory module and was executed in assist of the Pharmaceutical In-House Laboratory set of experiments that’s exploring growing and manufacturing medicines in house.
Earlier, Yui labored inside SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft transferring objects because it nears its departure deliberate for later this month. Williams had begun his day with Cardman contained in the Tranquility module packing {hardware} for stowage contained in the NanoRacks Bishop airlock.
Roscosmos Flight Engineer Oleg Platonov began his day carrying an acoustic monitor round his neck that recorded him as he exhaled forcefully for a examine researching lung operate in weightlessness. Afterward, he inventoried medical kits making certain prescribed drugs and {hardware} have been updated. Cosmonauts Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and Sergei Mikaev familiarized themselves with the identical lung operate examine Platonov participated in and realized concerning the acoustic traits of the trachea, monitoring the respiratory system, and early analysis of potential space-caused respiratory problems.
Earlier, Mikaev labored contained in the Zarya module looking for and documenting the placement of quite a lot of {hardware}. Kud-Sverchkov additionally labored inside Zarya inventorying video {hardware} earlier than changing filters and cleansing life assist gear within the Rassvet module.
Study extra about station actions by following the house station weblog, @space_station on X, in addition to the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.
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