Shuttle Astronauts Take A Walk After Releasing Science Satellite Endeavour’s Crew Practicing Space Construction Techniques

Two spacewalking astronauts stepped outside the shuttle Endeavour early today to practice orbital construction techniques 200 miles above Earth.

“Oh, it’s quite a view,” said space-walker Leroy Chiao.

Chiao and Daniel Barry couldn’t wait to venture out into the open cargo bay.

Neither man has performed a spacewalk before. Neither has Winston Scott, who will accompany Chiao on a second spacewalk Wednesday. That’s the point - the National Aeronautics and Space Administration needs experienced spacewalkers to help assemble an international space station in a few years.

The three men are trying out new construction tools and connectors as well as modified suits designed to keep them warm in the dead cold of space.

“We’ll be evaluating the (station) design concepts, the maintenance concepts and the assembly concepts … to make sure that we come up with a design and methods that will work,” Chiao said Sunday.

Before they could turn their attention to today’s 6-hour spacewalk, the six crewmen had to release a NASA science satellite for two days of free flight in orbit.

Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata freed the shiny, boxy satellite as Endeavour zoomed over the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Brazil on Sunday. A day earlier, he had used the shuttle’s robot arm to retrieve another science satellite, launched by his country last year.

The $10 million NASA satellite is to be retrieved Tuesday. Among other things, it contains spacecraft contamination, laser and amateur radio experiments.

The astronauts got an unexpected visual treat Sunday, three days into their nine-day mission.

Just minutes before the satellite release, a Delta rocket carrying a Korean communications satellite blasted off from Cape Canaveral. The astronauts were able to watch the rising rocket - a bright, white ball of light in the pre-dawn sky.

“It was a beautiful sight, up above the atmosphere with a long plume,” Barry said. “It was truly something.”