U.S. Spacewalk To Air On NASA TV, Will Install Space Station Docking Port To Worldwide Audience
By NASA // August 9, 2016
world live coverage Friday, Aug. 19
(NASA) – NASA Television will bring to viewers around the world live coverage Friday, Aug. 19, as two NASA astronauts install a new gateway for American commercial crew spacecraft at the International Space Station — a significant milestone in NASA’s work to return crew launches to U.S. soil.
Coverage of the spacewalk will begin at 6:30 a.m. EDT Aug. 19, on NASA TV and the agency’s website, with the spacewalk scheduled to begin at 8:05 a.m.
Leading up to the spacewalk, NASA TV will air a briefing from the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston at 2 p.m. Monday, Aug. 15, during which station and commercial crew experts will discuss the process and significance of installing and connecting the first of two international docking adapters (IDAs) that will be used for the future arrivals of Boeing and SpaceX commercial crew spacecraft.
The briefing participants are:
• Kenneth Todd, International Space Station Operations Integration manager
• Steve Stich, deputy manager of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program
• Zeb Scoville, spacewalk flight director
• Glenda Brown, lead spacewalk officer
The adapter was launched on a SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft and arrived at the station July 20. Expedition 48 Commander Jeff Williams and Flight Engineer Kate Rubins of NASA will conduct the spacewalk to install the equipment. This will be the fourth spacewalk in Williams’ career, the first for Rubins, and the 194th for the space station.
The two astronauts will venture outside the space station’s Quest airlock to install the first IDA onto Pressurized Mating Adapter-2, located on the forward end of the Harmony module.
On Wednesday, Aug. 17, ground controllers will use the Canadarm2 robotic arm, and its attached “Dextre” Special Purpose Dexterous Manipulator, to extract the IDA from the trunk of Dragon, and position it just inches away from PMA-2. There will be no live coverage of the trunk removal and IDA positioning.
Commercial crew flights from Florida’s Space Coast to the International Space Station will restore America’s human spaceflight launch capability and increase the time U.S. crews can dedicate to scientific research, which is helping prepare astronauts for deep space missions, including the journey to Mars.
Livestream coverage can be seen here on Space Coast Daily.
