FIRST FEMALE WALK ON THE MOON
As you may know, if you like reading a lot about astronauts, Jessica Meir and Christina Koch ventured outside the International Space Station on Friday to replace a power controller.
The walk, which lasted seven hours and 17 minutes and included a brief call with President Trump, was not purposefully planned by the agency. As NASA explained it, one was bound to happen eventually because of the increasing number of female astronauts.
But news of the milestone attracted far greater interest than spacewalks normally do, and on Friday, American officials celebrated it as a historic achievement. They pointed to the agency’s ambitious goals to put the first woman and the next man on the moon, and then to forge a path to Mars.
Photograph: Handout/Nasa/AFP via Getty Images
Such a walk was supposed to take place in March, but it was postponed because NASA did not have two appropriately sized spacesuits available.
Women were not admitted into the astronaut program until 1978, and an American woman did not fly into space until Sally Ride did so in 1983. (Two Soviet women preceded her.) The first spacewalk took place in 1965, and in 1984, Kathryn D. Sullivan became the first American woman to perform one.
President Trump spoke to the astronauts Christina Koch and Jessica Meir, who stepped out of the International Space Station for the historic spacewalk on Friday.
Ms. McClain returned to Earth in June after 204 days in space, and Dr. Meir arrived at the space station in late September. Soon, the all-female spacewalk was back on.
Dr. Meir and Ms. Koch were initially tasked with installing lithium-ion batteries next Monday. The duo replaced the controller, which regulates the charge to the batteries that distribute solar power to the station.
Comentarios
Publicar un comentario