Leonard David's INSIDE OUTER SPACE

Image credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab

The Shenzhou-20 crew on board China’s orbiting space station completed their mission’s first series of extravehicular activities last Thursday.

Chen Dong and Chen Zhongrui worked for about eight hours outside China’s orbiting complex. Wang Jie assisted the pair throughout the mission from inside the Tiangong space station, with the space walk tasks aided by a team on Earth.

Node cabin

Chen Dong and Chen Zhongrui exited through the node cabin of the Tianhe core module. This marked the first time that astronauts had exited via the node cabin since the space station entered its application and development phase.

Zhang Qiao, an engineer with China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation told China Central Television (CCTV): “We have two airlock sections that serve as mutual backups. For this mission, which was designated to be conducted at the position close to the tail of the Mengtian lab module, we chose to exit through the node cabin. This could guarantee the best efficiency for both the robotic arm and astronauts’ operations.”

Image credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab

Debris shielding

According to CCTV the astronauts installed a debris shielding device at its designated location. The device had been previously deployed outside through the cargo airlock and temporarily positioned by the robotic arm.

Also, external equipment was inspected and maintained.

The Shenzhou-20 crew was sent into space from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China on April 24 this year to take over China’s Tiangong space station from their Shenzhou-19 colleagues.

They are scheduled to stay at Tiangong for approximately six months, during which they will witness the arrivals of the Tianzhou-9 cargo craft and Shenzhou-21 manned spaceship.

For a video on the space walk, go to:

https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1ERZToDUXi/