Live In Orbit: Spacewalkers Complete Noble Cause

Two NASA astronauts just installed new thermal blankets to the Hubble Space Telescope, completing the last task on the fifth and final spacewalk aimed at extending the life of the 19-year-old observatory.

The New Outer Blanket Layer, or NOBL, covers, were fixed on three equipment bay doors by spacewalking astronauts John Grunsfeld and Drew Feustel.

"Drew, it's a noble cause we're serving." said Grunsfeld, still anchored to the end of shuttle Atlantis' 50-foot robot arm.

"Ha, ha, ha. Oh John, you're a jokester some times," Feustel replied.

"John, if you're done monkeying around with the telescope," I'll take you back to the airlock," robot arm operator Megan McArthur said.

"Ok," Grunsfeld said. "Thanks."

The astronauts will spent the next half-hour or so taking a tool inventory and cleaning up the shuttle payload bay. Then they'll head to the airlock, marking the end of the last spacewalk on NASA's fifth and final mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope.

During five spacewalks on consecutive days, the astronauts outfitted Hubble with two new science instruments and brought two others back from the dead. They installed six new batteries and six new gyroscopes and three new thermal blankets.

"You guys have done it all," NASA astronaut Dan Burbank said from the Mission Control Center in Houston.

"You hear that, John? You've done it all," one of his crewmates said.

"We've done it all," another chimed in.

Said Grunsfeld: "It's been a great achievement."