It’s Spacewalk No. 2 for NASA’s 1-year spaceman

Friday’s trip was planned primarily for working on the cooling system of the space station. At this time, they made repairs to fix an issue which ISS residents were dealing with for 3 years now.

Kelly has been at the 250-mile-high outpost since March, and isn’t due back until next March.

During Friday’s spacewalk, the primary cooling system was recharged with ammonia and put back into service.

Over the course of their work, the astronauts remained outside in sunlight long enough for any stray ammonia to evaporate, so they did not need any tests in the airlock or to stay outside longer for an extra “bake-out”.

According to NASA’s press release, the next generation of astronauts selected by the agency may get an opportunity to fly in any one of the four USA vessels: Orion deep space exploration vehicle, the worldwide Space Station or the two commercial crew spacecraft now being developed in the U.S. In the first-ever spacewalk of the astronauts past week, headed by Kelly, the duo was on distinct tracks while performing a number of long-term maintenance tasks outside the station. “You make us proud”, Mission Control told the astronauts.

The ammonia leakage has been first detected three years ago and was eventually replaced with an ammonia pump.

Two spacewalking NASA astronauts undertook an interesting task on Friday, as they spent close to eight hours outside the global Space Station to do a few rather unusual plumbing work. After assessment, mission control deemed the damage minor and was of no threat to Kelly or the spacewalk. This was the 190 spacewalk outside of the ISS, bringing up the total spacewalking time to more than 1,192 hours combined.

Next, great care needed to be taken as the isolated systems were cleared of excess ammonia. Ammonia crystals are highly toxic and can easily cling to spacesuits. This time around, they had to install ammonia jumpers between truss segments. Luckily, this was not the case.

Later, the pair worked together to vent off residual ammonia from a plumbing line. One additional part of the mission, cinching the backup radiator in place along the side of the station and adding a protective cover, was not able to be completed.