Expedition 38 Preparing for Mission’s Fourth Spacewalk

Expedition 38 is working new science delivered aboard Cygnus including ongoing international and commercial research. The crew is also preparing for its fourth spacewalk in five weeks.

Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata worked on science experiments for students and a commercial organization. Wakata first videotaped a demonstration of the difference between gravity on Earth and microgravity on International Space Station. Later he worked on NanoRacks commercial research gear in the Kibo laboratory on an experiment delivered Sunday aboard the Cygnus resupply craft.

After spending his morning exercising, Flight Engineer Rick Mastracchio spent the rest of the afternoon with maintenance work on the Waste and Hygiene Compartment. He replaced urine hydraulic components in the Harmony node’s bathroom.

NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins set up the Space Linear Acceleration Mass Measurement Device (SLAMMD) to measure his body mass. Afterward, he continued work with a vaccine experiment using the commercial generic bioprocessing apparatus to help prevent infections on Earth and in space.

Commander Oleg Kotov and Flight Engineer Sergey Ryazanskiy are preparing for a spacewalk to complete unfinished work from a previous spacewalk. The cosmonaut duo is scheduled to exit the Pirs docking compartment in their Orlan spacesuits Jan. 27 at 9:10 a.m. EST.

During the previous spacewalk that took place Dec. 27, Kotov and Ryazanskiy installed then removed two cameras that experienced telemetry and connectivity issues. The extra work postponed the jettisoning of experiment gear and the installation of a payload boom.


Cosmonaut and veteran station resident Mikhail Tyurin reconfigured communications gear inside the Rassvet mini-research module. He spent the rest of the afternoon setting up sensors to check temperatures and air flows, checking electronics gear and downloading science data collected for the Obstanovka experiment