WASHINGTON, September 12 (RIA Novosti) - Two astronauts from the crew of U.S. shuttle Atlantis have started a space walk, a NASA spokesman said Tuesday.
The spokesman told RIA Novosti that Joe Tanner, who has already made five spacewalks, and Heidemarie Piper, who will exit into open space for the first time, would install a new set of solar arrays for the International Space Station that should double its power capacities.
The NASA news service said that the installation of arrays had been originally scheduled for May 2003 but had been postponed after the Columbia disaster, which claimed the lives of seven astronauts, in February of that year.
Atlantis, which was launched Saturday after two weeks of delays caused by storms and technical malfunctions, docked with the ISS at 2:48 p.m. Moscow time (10:48 a.m. GMT) Monday above the southeastern Pacific.
