Spacewalkers Drew Feustel (left) and John Grunsfeld work outside space shuttle Atlantis during the fifth and final Hubble spacewalk. Click to go to the NASA site. Photo Credit: NASA TV

Today is the final repair day for Hubble.   What a mission this has been so far.

As I write this I am watching the spacewalkers in action.  They got going about 08:20 am EDT.  The spacewalkers, John Grunsfeld and Drew Feustel are on what is scheduled for a 5 hour and 45 minute spacewalk.  They have already finished installing the Fine Guidance Sensor replacement.  As the name implies, the Fine Guidance Sensors provide pointing information and determine precise position and motion of stars.

The will finish battery work, replacing the second of two battery modules in the telescope’s Bay 3, and will replace the New Outer Blanket Layer or NOBL. on the doors afterwards.  The modules each contain three batteries and weigh in at 460 lbs.  The batteries provide power to the telescope during the night time portion of the Hubble orbit.  The batteries being replaced have lasted more than 13 years beyond the expected five year design time.

Finally, the very last thing to be done is to replace the NOBL on the Bay 5, the astronauts were unable to finish that task yesterday.  I wonder if it was because of the bolt problem from yesterday.  Sounds like they had a stripped bolt and eventually just pulled it out with brute force.

So far it sounds like all the repairs are checking out nicely with the Hubble team on the ground at least initially.  No word on today’s work yet.