Astronauts hustle through key spacewalk

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – Their mission nearing an end, the two space station astronauts installed antennas and released a baby Sputnik during a spacewalk Monday amid heightened safety and multiple breakdowns.

Commander Leroy Chiao and Russian crewmate Salizhan Sharipov left the International Space Station empty for the second time in just a couple of months, floating outside to perform the 220-mile-high maintenance work. They wrapped up the spacewalk in 4 1/2 hours, more than an hour early, earning praise for their quick action.

NASA and the Russian Space Agency instituted extra safety measures to avoid a repeat of a problem that occurred during the men’s spacewalk in January. Chiao got too close to firing thrusters during that first outing because of miscommunication, so flight controllers put unambiguous rules in place for Monday’s outing.

Complicating the spacewalk this time was a hampered stabilization system.

Two weeks ago, a circuit breaker cut power to one of the gyroscopes needed to keep the space station stable and pointed in the right direction. The breakdown left the station running on two gyroscopes, the bare minimum.

The two functioning gyroscopes became overloaded, and the space station ended up drifting around Earth and pitching over for 17 minutes. The spacewalkers ignored the failed circuit breaker. Visiting shuttle astronauts will tackle that job in two more months.