Live In Orbit: Solar Wings Prepped To Spread

Spacewalking astronauts are working hard outside the International Space Station, preparing a newly delivered central truss segment to spread its solar wings, doubling the amount of electrical power available for science experiments.

Discovery mission specialists Steve Swanson and Ricky Arnold are way out at the far end of the station's just completed truss -- which now stretches 335 feet from end to end, or longer than an American football field.

The two astronauts helped installed the final segment of the station's 11-segment truss earlier today, capping a decade-long effort to assemble the station's metallic backbone. They rigged up power and data cables that electrically linked the segment to the rest of the trust.

Now they are chattering away as they prepare for the deployment Friday of the station's fourth and final set of American solar wings.

The solar wings will stretch 240 feet from tip to tip -- longer than the wingspan of a Boeing 747 jumbo jet -- once they are unfurled in orbit. Now they are folded up in 15-foot blanket boxes. The astronauts aim to rotate the blanket boxes into position for a remote-control deployment later this week.

You can watch all the action unfold right here in The Flame Trench. Simply click the NASA TV box on the righthand side of the page to launch our NASA TV viewer and live coverage of the spacewalk. Be sure to refresh this page for periodic updates.

Swanson and Arnold are five hours into a planned 6.5-hour spacewalk. The deployment of the solar wings will raise the amount of U.S. electrical power at the station to 120 watts. NASA officials say that is enough electricity to power 55 homes that are each 2,800-square-feet -- a small neighborhood.