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“Explains the tools, tethers, space suits, life support systems, and maneuvering units to be used during extravehicular activity (EVA) tasks planned for shuttle operations. These tasks will help provide cost-effective, reliable, and sensible servicing operations for payloads.” The astronaut demonstrating the Space Shuttle Extravehicular Mobility Unit space suit is George “Pinky” Nelson.
NASA film JSC-805, Johnson Space Center
Space Shuttle Missions playlist:
Public domain film from NASA, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and mild video noise reduction applied.
The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original).
Extravehicular activity (EVA) is any activity done by an astronaut or cosmonaut outside a spacecraft beyond the Earth’s appreciable atmosphere. The term most commonly applies to a spacewalk made outside a craft orbiting Earth (such as the International Space Station), but also has applied to lunar surface exploration (commonly known as moonwalks) performed by six pairs of American astronauts in the Apollo program from 1969 to 1972. On each of the last three of these missions, astronauts also performed deep-space EVAs on the return to Earth, to retrieve film canisters from the outside of the spacecraft. Astronauts also used EVA in 1973 to repair launch damage to Skylab, the United States’ first space station.
A “Stand-up” EVA (SEVA) is where the astronaut does not fully leave a spacecraft, but is completely reliant on the spacesuit for environmental support.[1] Its name derives from the astronaut “standing up” in the open hatch, usually to film or assist a spacewalking astronaut.
EVAs may be either tethered (the astronaut is connected to the spacecraft; oxygen and electrical power can be supplied through an umbilical cable; no propulsion is needed to return to the spacecraft), or untethered. Untethered spacewalks were only performed on three missions in 1984 using the Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU), and on a flight test in 1994 of the Simplified Aid for EVA Rescue (SAFER). A SAFER is a safety device worn on tethered U.S. EVAs, since the capability of returning to the spacecraft is essential.
Russia, the United States and China have demonstrated the capability to conduct an EVA…
Capability milestones
– The first untethered spacewalk was made by American Bruce McCandless II on February 7, 1984, during Challenger mission STS-41-B, using the Manned Maneuvering Unit. He was subsequently joined by Robert L. Stewart during the 5 hour 55 minute spacewalk. A self-contained spacewalk was first attempted by Eugene Cernan in 1966 on Gemini 9A, but Cernan could not reach the maneuvering unit without tiring.
– The first metalwork in open space, consisting of welding, brazing and metal spraying, was conducted by Soviet cosmonauts Svetlana Savitskaya and Vladimir Dzhanibekov on July 25, 1984. A specially designed URI multipurpose tool was used to perform these activities during a 3 hour, 30 minute EVA outside the Salyut 7 space station.
– The first three-person EVA was performed on May 13, 1992, as the third EVA of STS-49, the maiden flight of Endeavour. Pierre Thuot, Richard Hieb, and Thomas Akers conducted the EVA to hand-capture and repair a non-functional Intelsat VI-F3 satellite. As of 2013 it was the only three-person EVA.
– The first EVA to perform an in-flight repair of the Space Shuttle was by American Steve Robinson on August 3, 2005, during “Return to Flight” mission STS-114. Robinson was sent to remove two protruding gap fillers from Discovery’s heat shield, after engineers determined there was a small chance they could affect the shuttle upon re-entry. Robinson successfully removed the loose material while Discovery was docked to the International Space Station.
– The longest EVA as of 2007, was 8 hours and 56 minutes, performed by Susan J. Helms and James S. Voss on March 11, 2001…
