Following the conclusion of a study into water discovered in a spacesuit during a spacewalk earlier this year, NASA is prepared to restart spacewalks outside the International Space Station.
After locating the cause of a tiny coating of water that accumulated on the visor of European Space Agency astronaut Matthias Maurer at the conclusion of a spacewalk on March 23, the agency stated on October 18 that it anticipated to resume spacewalks at the station in mid-November. While they looked into the incident, NASA station administrators declared in May that they were "no-go" for routine spacewalks.
This study, which included bringing the spacesuit Maurer was wearing back to Earth for examination on a SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft in August, came to the conclusion that the suit itself had no specific hardware problem.
In response, NASA claims it has revised processes and created "new mitigation hardware" to reduce water buildup and absorb any that does occur within the helmet. According to NASA, spacewalks on the station can start up again with these steps.
In a statement, Kathy Lueders, NASA's associate administrator for space operations, said: "I'm proud of the space station and ground teams' work to keep our crew members safe, for taking the time necessary to close out the investigation, and for continually finding ways to mitigate risks in human spaceflight.
The suspension of spacewalks didn't significantly affect ISS operations. Up until the end of the year, when three spacewalks are slated to replace the station's existing solar arrays, NASA had no spacewalks scheduled.
Source: spacenews
Edited By: Bidyut Gogoi