Russian Cosmonauts to Activate Space Station’s New Robotic Arm

On Monday, April 18 (UPI), two Russian cosmonauts aboard the International Space Station completed the first of two spacewalks to activate the station’s new European Robotic Arm. The two Cosmonauts were Oleg Artemyev and Denis Matveev, and they began their nearly seven-hour spacewalk at 11:01 a.m. ET ended at 5:37 p.m. ET, lasting for six hours and 37 minutes. During Monday’s spacewalk, the two removed the arm’s protective covers and installed handrails outside the Nauka module.

NASA Website live-streamed the cosmonauts during the spacewalk to activate the 37-foot long arm, which will be used to transport heavy items and help spacewalkers. The European Space Agency said that the new associate will navigate across the Russian segment of the space station and can carry a load of up to 17,000 pounds. It is one of three systems that can take and move large objects outside the ISS.

On April 28, a second spacewalk for the cosmonauts has been scheduled, when they will remove the arm’s protective thermal blankets and test its mobility. People agreed that the two spacewalkers were on their Final task to continue preparing the European Robotic Arm for operations on the station. On April 28, the cosmonaut pair will remove thermal blankets used to protect the robotic arm when it launched last year and the Nauka module. Matveev and Artemyev will also flex the robotic arm’s joints, release restraints and test its grappling ability. It was the first spacewalk for Matveev and a fourth for veteran spacewalker Artemyev.

Also, spacewalks are planned to continue to outfit the European robotic arm and activate Nauka’s airlock for future spacewalks,” Nasa said. Additional spacewalks are scheduled to continue to equip the European robotic arm and activate Nauka’s airlock for future spacewalks,” Nasa said. Last month, the Russian module arrived at the space station as Moscow replaced the Piers module that disintegrated into the atmosphere during re-entry. Eleven spacewalks are planned to ready the Nauka (the Russian word for ‘science’) module. The Nauka Module, which docked at the space station in July, will serve as a research lab, storage unit, and airlock for the Russian segment.

The module led to a major mishap on the station hours after arrival as its jet thrusters fired, inadvertently throwing the flying outpost out of control. Vladimir Solovyov, the designer general at Energia, a Russian space agency company, sought to reassure international partners that the incident had been contained and said cosmonauts would have Nauka the module up and running soon.

When Asked how the geopolitical tensions with Russia have affected life on the space station, NASA astronaut Dr. Tom Marshburn said during a Friday news conference that it’s been a “collegial, amicable relationship together up here, and we’re working together.”
HE SAID the NASA crew and Russian cosmonauts regularly share meals and watch movies together. “We rely on each other for our survival,” Marshburn said, “It is a dangerous environment. And so we go with our training; we go with recognizing that we are all up here for the same purpose: to explore and keep this space station maintained.”