Astronaut to Attempt Spacewalk Record

MattSparkes writes "Two residents of the International Space Station will take a spacewalk tomorrow to try to jam a stuck antenna on a docked cargo ship back into place. The spacewalk will set a US record of over 65 hours spacewalk experience. During the spacewalk, the astronauts will "use a hammer and a chisel to try to pound the antenna into place". Precision engineering at its very best I'm sure you'll agree."

Life immitating Art. ( Armageddon (1998))

[arthurpaliden]

When the Russian cosmonaught takes a hammer to the fuel systems saying "this is how we fix things in Russia". Or something to that effect.

Related metalworking question-

[mikeasu]

I'm not a metalworker, so I'll ask a stupid question here...

If you're chiselling a piece of metal, aren't pieces of the metal going to flake off? I'm just thinking of the orbiting debris issue - would the specks be too small to worry about?

Re:Please...

[Nf1nk]

I know you are joking, but try to use a dead blow hammer sometime. its kind of creepy to have the hammer just sort of die on impact. It wouldn't surprise me if they were using dead blows for this job to minimize the bounceback.

Re:A Hammer?

[networkBoy]

From what I understood of TFA, they're simply trying to get the antenna back into place before they can destroy the whole cargo ship by letting it burn in the atmosphere.

does anyone else think it odd that an antenna must be put back in place so it can burn up in the atmosphere? Reminds me about the guy on death row in California that got a heart transplant. Except at least I can see the astronauts wanting to get the "most spacewalking hours" record. I can't imagine the surgeon wanting the "most pointless and morally wasteful surgery ever"* award.
-nB

*While the merits of the death penalty are debatable, that's not the point. This guy failed his appeals and will be (was?) put to death. Giving him a heart that could save someone else not guilty of murdering another human is simply wrong.