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ISS - Astronaut Carlos Noriega

ISS space walk number three a success

8 December 2000
The third and last space walk of the Endeavour STS-97 mission to the International Space Station (ISS) ended successfully on Thursday at 21.23 (UT). In fact, as Mission specialists Joe Tanner and Carlos Noriega finished their assigned tasks early, they were able to get on with tasks scheduled for future assembly missions.

This last of the three space walks for the STS-97 mission lasted exactly five hours and 10 minutes, bringing the total space-walk time on this mission to 19 hours and 10 minutes. During this last walk, astronauts tensioned a solar blanket on the ISS starboard solar array and installed probes to measure the electrical potential of plasma around the station.

Meanwhile the crew on board the ISS continued to pack items to be returned to Earth on the Space Shuttle Endeavour when it leaves at the weekend. Other tasks performed by the ISS crew during the week include setting up a wireless instrumentation system to measure and further model the station’s integrity when shuttle steering jets fire, replacing a malfunctioning fan in the carbon dioxide removal system to ensure that this life-support unit works correctly and installing a new air conditioning unit to replace one that failed earlier in the week. As a result, humidity levels in the station are now decreasing.

Later today the two crews will meet for the first time when the hatches between the two vehicles are opened.

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