Jeff Williams, commander of Expedition 48, and flight engineer Kate Rubins ventured outside of the space station, one minute ahead of schedule. The spacewalk came to an early end at 2:02 p.m. EDT (1802 GMT) due to a minor communication problem.
"The view is phenomenal," Rubins said, as she exited the space station's Quest airlock. Today's spacewalk marked a first for Rubins and the fourth of Williams' career.
The installation of the IDA means the space station will be able to accommodate various space taxis, including SpaceX and Boeing vehicles. Before now, only Russian vehicles were able to dock with space station.
Due to broken communication with Williams' right ear piece, additional minor "go ahead" tasks were called-off and the two astronauts headed back to the space station's airlock.
On Sept. 1, Williams and Rubins are likely to perform a second 6.5-hour spacewalk to retract one of the station's thermal radiators, among other tasks. Williams will return home Sept. 6 with Russian cosmonauts Oleg Skripochka and Alexey Ovchinin. Williams is set to surpass Scott Kelly's record for the most total cumulative time spent in space by an American, with a total of 534 days.
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