Video – Six Hours in a Vacuum: Images of Thomas Peskett leaving the ISS

Three! French astronaut Thomas Basquet began this Wednesday in the space vacuum for the third time in his career, alongside American Shane Kimberly. Their purpose: to install a new solar panel at the International Space Station. A complex and very physical extra vehicle journey (“EVA”) that lasts six and a half hours.

The two have already undertaken two space orbits side by side in 2017, but this is technically unprecedented for the first time since arriving at ISS in late April. Two “Mechanics” will deploy a new generation solar panel called IRSA, the first in a series of six panels aimed at increasing ISS’s energy production capacity.

“We go out into the vacuum. I will be carried by a robotic arm holding 3m long solar panels. We will insert them and return to the station after 6:30”, he said. Thomas Basket tweeted a few hours before he was released. On Sunday, June 20, the same team will resume operations to install a second one. The panels supplied by the SpaceX cargo ship are now rolling themselves, and the astronauts’ goal is to secure them in place and deploy them.

Before opening the spacecraft, NASA showed the two producing images, which were locked in their spacecraft, assisted by their American counterparts Megan McArthur and Mark Vande Hay. This is the 239th spacewalk in ISS history.

Unlike two trips made by the same team in 2017, this time the characters have been turned upside down: Thomas Basket “EVA1”, Shane Kimbero “EVA2”. “N ° 1 Chief Wholesale. Now I’m no longer a young man.”, Commented the 43-year-old Frenchman. “I can’t wait for Thomas to be in this role and a good supporter.”, Said his 54-year-old colleague. For the American, this is the seventh space route of his career.

“There is fear, it has been working for hundreds of people for years, a mistake that costs a million dollars and we do not want to break the equipment. “, Thomas Baskett said in his record book France Inter.

The astronauts split missions during the mission, which was precisely danced by NASA. Objective: Arrange the solar panels on the port side of the ISS, like a football field at the end of the mastodon. Thomas Pesket was engaged in the task of retrieving 350 kilograms of material, and then, moved by the hands of a robot, he had to walk with the station to send it to his side.

However, the move had to be halted in half. NASA teams have noticed an interruption in data transfer to check the condition of Shane Kimbero’s case, as well as a sudden increase in the pressure of the space cooling system. So before the astronaut could leave, he had to return to the station’s plane and perform a reset.

Meanwhile, Thomas Baskett was waiting for him, the robot hanging by the legs with his hand. With the control data back and confirmed, this task was finally restarted. Shane Kimbero has never been “In danger”, Promised to the US space agency. The two then had to adjust and finish the panel, and then its line had to start with a length of 19 meters.

Attempts the mission of two astronauts. “An EVA is like running 100 meters for the duration of a marathon”, AFP explains to Herve Stevens, who is in charge of training for these cruises for the European Space Agency (ESA). “Working in a diving suit is very difficult. All senses are limited, you have no skills with gloves: holding a tool is like pressing a tennis ball hundreds of times in six hours.”, Describes the instructor.

Despite the low level of vision, astronauts should always be one “Awareness of their environment beyond everyday life”. Not to mention the awkwardness: with production time, they are stuck in their diving suit for ten hours, a “Tin cup”, Only with a small pocket of water to drink.

After all, being one, there is no risk of two people falling into the vacuum “Three security”, Including a cable that connects permanently to the station, “Gravity” prevents the dream scene of the film from happening in real life, assures the expert.