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Spacewalking NASA 'nauts hook up power and data cables to ISS Harmony module

Rigged up for future commercial crew 'craft to dock

NASA astronauts clocked up hours of walking in the void of space on Saturday, as they continued to rig the forward end of the Harmony module and Pressurised Mating Adapter-2 with power and data cables.

Terry Virts and Barry Wilmore routed 340 of 360 feet of cable during their walks, the U.S. space agency said.

NASA added:

The cable routing work is part of a reconfiguration of station systems and modules to accommodate the delivery of new docking adapters that commercial crew vehicles [such as SpaceX] will use later this decade to deliver astronauts to the orbital laboratory.

Virts, whose first spacewalk took place yesterday, lasted 6 hours and 41 minutes in the void. Meanwhile, Wilmore has now put 13 hours and 15 minutes on the clock having completed two spacewalks as part of the project.

NASA said that 'nauts had now spent a total of 1,159 hours and 8 minutes assembling kit and maintaining the orbiting lab, which – fact fans – has involved 185 spacewalks to date.

The spacemen will carry out their next walk on Wednesday, 25 February. Virts and Wilmore are expected to rollout two more cables and lubricate the end of the space station's robotic arm.

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