Friday, May 15, 2009

Live in Orbit: Hubble gets first fresh batteries

Atlantis astronaut Mike Good has finished bolting a fresh set of batteries into place on the Hubble Space Telescope.

He and partner Mike Massimino are cleaning up their supplies before heading back into the shuttle airlock to end an extended spacewalk.

Trouble installing a new pair of gyroscopes put the team behind schedule.

The battery work was completed nearly seven hours and 30 minutes into the spacewalk - about an hour longer than the mission's spacewalk was scheduled to last.

It was the first of two sets of three batteries to be installed, replacing originals powering Hubble since 1990.

The second set is scheduled to be installed on the last of the 11-day mission's five consecutive spacewalks, planned Monday.

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