Atlantis Crew Preparing for Third Spacewalk

The STS-125 crew awoke this morning at 5:31 a.m. EDT to “Hotel Cepollina” performed by Fuzzbox Piranha. The song was played for Mission Specialist John Grunsfeld.

Grunsfeld and Mission Specialist Drew Feustel are preparing for the third spacewalk of Atlantis’ mission to the Hubble Space Telescope. Today’s spacewalk, slated to begin at 8:16 a.m., will focus on the removal of the Corrective Optics Space Telescope Axial Replacement, the installation of the new Cosmic Origins Spectrograph and the repair of the Advanced Camera for Surveys.

Third Spacewalk on Tap for STS-125 Crew

STS-125 mission specialists John Grunsfeld and Drew Feustel will venture outside of the shuttle again today for the mission’s third spacewalk. The spacewalk is scheduled to begin at 8:16 a.m. EDT.

For this spacewalk, the spacewalkers will focus on the installation of the telescope’s new Cosmic Origins Spectrograph, and the first part of the Advanced Camera for Surveys repair work. The work on the camera may be finished later in the mission if time permits or the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph repair on the fourth spacewalk is not successful. In that case, the rest of the Advanced Camera for Surveys work would be added to the fifth spacewalk, replacing the Fine Guidance Sensor work.

Today’s spacewalk is scheduled to last 6½ hours.

Please feel free to discuss this topic further in the forum or chat…