Watch Live As Astronauts Fix The Space Station Saturday

There’s a cooling problem on station, and two astronauts are ready to head outside to fix it. NASA astronauts Rick Mastracchio (a six-time spacewalker) and Mike Hopkins (a rookie) are expected to spend 6.5 hours “outside” starting at 7:10 a.m. EST (12:10 p.m. UTC) on Saturday. On robotics will be Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata, who has operated every bit of robotics currently on station.

Click to watch Expedition 38’s crew action live above. (If for some reason the stream is not working, an alternate link is available here.) We’ll have full coverage of the spacewalk after it happens, too.

For a walkthrough of what’s going to happen, NASA handily provided a video that you can see below the jump. We also have links to all of our coverage so far.

In a nutshell, here’s what happened: a cooling loop shut down automatically on station Dec. 11 when the loop got too cold. NASA traced the problem to a faulty flow control valve inside of the pump. As agency officials prepared for a spacewalk just in case, NASA attempted to fix the valve and then control an alternate one from the ground.

However, the station is entering a time when there will be a lot of sun shining on it, making dockings and spacewalks difficult. To be prudent, NASA decided to do a spacewalk now and replace the pump. To keep the astronauts safe if another spacesuit leak happens again, the agency has introduced soaker pads and snorkels to the spacesuits.

Here’s what’s going to happen during the three spacewalks that are scheduled for Saturday, Monday (Dec. 23) and if necessary, Wednesday (Dec. 25), according to lead U.S. Spacewalk Officer Allison Bolinger:

Elizabeth Howell

Elizabeth Howell is the senior writer at Universe Today. She also works for Space.com, Space Exploration Network, the NASA Lunar Science Institute, NASA Astrobiology Magazine and LiveScience, among others. Career highlights include watching three shuttle launches, and going on a two-week simulated Mars expedition in rural Utah. You can follow her on Twitter @howellspace or contact her at her website.

Recent Posts

An Otherworldly Cloud Over New Zealand

Filmmakers love New Zealand. Its landscapes evoke other worlds, which explains why so much of…

8 hours ago

Early Black Holes Fed 40x Faster than Should Be Possible

The theory goes that black holes accrete material, often from nearby stars. However the theory…

8 hours ago

A Spider Stellar Engine Could Move Binary Stars Halfway Across a Galaxy

Eventually, every stellar civilization will have to migrate to a different star. The habitable zone…

9 hours ago

Scaling Propellant Production on Mars is Hard

Putting humans on Mars has been one of NASA's driving missions for years, but they…

14 hours ago

Is an ‘Off-Year’ Leonid Outburst in the Cards For November?

There are good reasons to keep an eye on the Leonid meteors this year.

15 hours ago

Reaction Engines Goes Into Bankruptcy, Taking the Hypersonic SABRE Engine With it

Rarely does something get developed which is a real game changer in space exploration. One…

20 hours ago