Spacewalk complete: NASA's Anil Menon and ESA's Sophie Adenot finish ISS antenna repair (watch video)

On Tuesday, August 25, Menon and Adenot stepped out of the International Space Station (ISS) to finish a repair job they had started a week earlier. This spacewalk is officially logged as U.S. spacewalk 98 and was also the 283rd spacewalk in the station's history. It was also the 6th spacewalk of this year. During their time outside of the ISS, they swapped out a broken Space-to-Ground antenna. The spacewalk lasted for about 6 and a half hours and concluded at 2:57 p.m. EDT.

This was Menon's third spacewalk in a row. He had earlier completed his first-ever excursion on August 6, and the August 18 walk with Adenot. For Adenot, it was her second spacewalk, and she made history during the first one by becoming the fifth French astronaut to conduct a spacewalk and the first woman from France to do so. NASA streamed the walk live on its official YouTube channel, as well as on other platforms such as X, Discovery+, Amazon Prime, and NASA+.

In the final moments of the spacewalk, Anil Menon took a moment to thank the entire team by saying, “I'm proud we continue to accomplish challenges like today's and demonstrate NASA's deep capability to work in the harshest of environments. Today proves that it's the resiliency that we have to not give up and make this a success.” Adding to this, Sophie Adenot shared a message for the young generation from space: “Never underestimate what humanity can achieve when we work together; there's still so much to explore and even more to create. So keep dreaming, building bridges.”

What did they do during the U.S. Spacewalk 98?

During the spacewalk, the team was tasked with swapping out a broken Space-to-Ground antenna. This is the piece of hardware that carries high-speed data between the orbiting lab and NASA's Mission Control Center in Houston. Without it working properly, communication between the crew and the ground gets a lot harder. 

The pair had already removed the failed antenna and secured it to the station's truss structure during an August 18 spacewalk that ran 6 hours and 23 minutes, which was longer than expected. This delay pushed the installation of the replacement antenna to this second outing. Now that the antenna is back online, the station's communication setup is expected to be at full strength again.

Informing about this spacewalk, NASA shared, “During the 6‑hour, 30‑minute spacewalk, Menon and Adenot successfully installed and connected the spare Space‑to‑Ground antenna, a critical link that enables high‑speed data transmission between NASA’s Mission Control Center in Houston and the orbital complex. Afterward, they secured the failed unit, which was removed and temporarily stowed during the duo’s spacewalk on Aug. 18, to a spare‑parts platform on the station’s truss structure.”

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