Associated Press
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Two astronauts stepped out into the vacuum of space Wednesday and successfully performed the riskiest surgery yet on the Hubble Space Telescope, a power-unit replacement that was likened to a heart transplant.
The operation required that Hubble be turned off completely for the first time in orbit, a frightening prospect for astronomers. But after a four-hour, 25-minute shutdown, the newly installed unit was powered up and, to everyone’s relief, passed its initial test.
"A postoperative report: We have a heartbeat," Mission Control informed the astronauts. Within minutes, power was surging through other telescope systems.
The spacewalk, the third in as many days for shuttle Columbia’s crew, got started late because of a leaky spacesuit.
An unusual and unexplained water seepage from astronaut John Grunsfeld’s suit forced him to pull off his soaked top and get into a dry one. It pushed back the spacewalk by two hours, adding dramatic suspense to an already tension-filled day.
It took the two spacewalkers about 3 1/2hours to remove the old power control unit and plug in the new one.
NASA said it had to replace the 12-year-old power control unit because it had a loose screw that hampered its ability to circulate electricity through the telescope. If it weren’t replaced, astronomers would have been able to operate only one or two scientific instruments at a time.
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