According to officials from the United States and Russia, one of the two astronauts working outside the International Space Station (ISS) on August 17 safely returned to the airlock of the laboratory after a electrical issue related to the astronaut’s spacesuit forced Moscow’s ground control to order an early termination of the routine spacewalk.
Astronaut Oleg Artemyev (top) and astronaut Denis Matveev working outside the International Space Station (ISS) on July 21, 2022. (Photo: AFP/TTXVN)
Astronaut Oleg Artemyev had just completed nearly half of the planned six-hour spacewalk when the battery in his spacesuit began to deplete rapidly, prompting controllers in Moscow to order him to return to the ISS airlock immediately.
NASA spokesperson Rob Navias confirmed that during this incident, the Russian astronaut “was never in any danger.”
Earlier, Denis Matveev, the other Russian astronaut participating in the spacewalk, successfully completed the task of installing an upgraded robotic arm.
The ISS, a laboratory the size of a football field in low Earth orbit, has hosted many international astronaut teams over the past two decades, primarily from Russia, the United States, Japan, Canada, and Europe.
