NASA astronauts Moghbeli and O'Hara embark on rare all-female spacewalk
Nov. 1 (UPI) -- NASA astronauts Jasmin Moghbeli and Loral O'Hara launched the space agency's fourth ever all-female spacewalk Wednesday, participating in science research and along with maintenance of the International Space Station.
Moghbeli and O'Hara kicked off the six-hour spacewalk by exiting the Quest airlock to remove an electronics box called the Radio Frequency Group from the station's truss temporarily stowed after a faulty communications antenna was replaced in December 2021.
They were also set to replace one of 12 trundle bearing assemblies on a solar alpha rotary joint. The bearings enable the station's solar arrays to rotate to track the sun as the station orbits the Earth to collect and store electricity for power generation for station systems.
Their spacewalk was originally set for Oct. 20, but an ammonia coolant leak on a backup radiator on Russia's Nauka module was discovered on Oct. 9. Two cosmonauts performed a spacewalk on Oct. 25 to find the source of the leak.
While this is the fourth all-woman spacewalk in NASA history, it is the first made without Christina Koch and Jessica Meir, who made the first three.
NASA said more women spacewalkers will be added to that exclusive list in the future.
"[They] will not be the last as we continue to live and work in space," agency officials told Space.com this month.
