Two Chinese astronauts on the Shenzhou 18 mission performed a spacewalk on July 3rd to continue installing debris shields outside the Tiangong space station.
The astronauts, Ye Guangfu and Li Cong, spent around 6.5 hours working outside Tiangong. Their main task was mounting space debris shielding to protect equipment and cables on the station.
Fellow astronaut Li Guangsu assisted from inside the station using the robotic arm. Li Cong also used the arm later in the spacewalk to conduct an exterior inspection of Tiangong facilities.
The shields help protect the station from impacts by space debris and micrometeoroids over the long operation of Tiangong. This EVA built on a previous record-setting 8.5 hour spacewalk in May.
In total there have now been 16 EVAs outside Tiangong conducted by Chinese astronauts since the station launched in 2021. The Shenzhou 15 crew set the record with four spacewalks last year.
The spacewalk is part of ongoing work to complete construction of the modular Tiangong space station over the next couple years.
Source: Space
