NASA TV is Live as Astronauts Get Ready for Spacewalk

NASA Television coverage of today's spacewalk with NASA astronaut Shane Kimbrough and ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Thomas Pesquet is now underway and is also available on the NASA app and the agency's website.

The crew members of Expedition 65 are preparing to go outside the International Space Station for a spacewalk expected to begin at approximately 8 a.m. EDT and last about six and a half hours.

The crew is in their spacesuits in the airlock in preparation to exit the space station and begin today's activities to install and deploy the first new ISS Roll-Out Solar Array (iROSA) to upgrade the station's power supply.

As illustrated in a NASA animation, Kimbrough and Pesquet will be working near the farthest set of current solar arrays on the station's left (port) side, known as P6, to upgrade the 2B power channel. First they will prepare and release the new solar array from the carrier in which it arrived aboard the SpaceX cargo Dragon and operators in the Mission Control Center at NASA's Johnson Space Center maneuvered into place for today's spacewalk using the station's robotic Canadarm2.

From his position attached to the end of the Canadarm2, Pesquet will maneuver the array out of the carrier, and operators will move the robotic arm as far out on the station as it can reach, where he will pass the array to Kimbrough. Pesquet will reposition himself to receive the array from Kimbrough and move it to its final installation location. The crew members will work together to install it, rotate it to its deploy location, and position the mounting bolts, install the electrical cables, and drive the final two bolts to extend the solar array to its fully deployed position.

Leading the mission control team today is Flight Director Ron Spencer with support from Kieth Johnson as the lead spacewalk officer.

Learn more about station activities by following the space station blog, @space_station and @ISS_Research on Twitter as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.