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World’s Oldest Spacewalker Record Set During Yesterday’s ISS Excursion

By Elaine Radford
Published on: 07:27 PST, Apr 20, 2013

The world’s oldest spacewalker title was quietly claimed yesterday when 59-year-old Russian cosmonaut Pavel Vinogradov stepped out of the International Space Station a bit after 10 AM EDT to upgrade some new experiments on the exterior of the orbiting lab.

NASA had live streaming of the six hour outer-space event, but unfortunately a great many people missed the show because of Friday’s tension-filled manhunt for 19-year-old Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.

During the history-making spacewalk, the world’s oldest spacewalker was joined by a second-generation spacewalker, 41-year-old Roman Romanenko, also a Russian. It was his first walk in outer space, but he’s the son of retired cosmonaut Yuri Romanenko, who logged over 10 hours in space during his career.

Their chores included installing devices to study space weather and the effects of microbes on spacecraft. They also replaced a faulty reflector on a navigational device.

Near the end of the six hour effort, Vinogradov accidentally dropped an experiment panel, which moved out of reach so that it couldn’t be retrieved. NASA said it won’t hit the ISS and that they don’t expect any real problems as a result of the minor mishap.

The excursion was the 167th ISS spacewalk. Vinogradov himself has now spent 38 hours, 25 minutes in space.

The Russian crew had already set another record when they traveled to the ISS on a Soyuz craft in late March. After launching in Karakhstan, they used a new shortcut to reach the ISS in only six hours. The trip had previously taken two days.

Congratulations to Pavel Vinogradov, the new record holder for the world’s oldest spacewalker.

[photo of International Space Station courtesy NASA]

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