Thomas Marshburn worked on the international space station yesterday.
(NASA TV via Associated Press)
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Astronauts completed the last spacewalk of their shared shuttle and station mission yesterday, breezing through some rewiring, camera setups, and other outdoor chores.
Christopher Cassidy and Thomas Marshburn got so far ahead on the flight’s fifth spacewalk that they even took on extra work, a welcome change from earlier excursions that were bogged down by balky equipment and other obstacles.
“We’re out of tasks,’’ Mission Control finally called up.
Only one item was left undone. Mission Control was reluctant to have the spacewalkers take on a drawn-out storage platform job.
The spacewalk ended up lasting just under five hours and set the stage for shuttle Endeavour’s scheduled departure today.
The spacewalkers rearranged electrical hookups for a pair of gyroscopes, giving them separate power supplies, and folded down a piece of popped-up insulation on a small robot hand at the international space station. Then they hooked up two TV cameras on the brand new porch of a Japanese lab, installed by the two crews last week. The cameras will assist in experiment work on the porch, and in the docking in two months of a Japanese cargo carrier.
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