The International Space Station is pictured in its current configuration, in a 2011 photo. THE CANADIAN PRESS/HO, NASA
January 27, 2014 - 6:49 AM
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Two space station astronauts are making a spacewalk to install a pair of cameras developed by a Canadian firm.
Russians Oleg Kotov and Sergey Ryazanskiy ventured outside the International Space Station today to install Vancouver-based UrtheCast Corp.'s space cameras.
They are completing a job left undone last month.
The men hooked up the Earth-observing cameras during a spacewalk right after Christmas, but ground controllers received no data from the cameras, and the spacewalkers had to take everything back inside.
The problem was traced to indoor cabling and fixed. Images from the new cameras are to be distributed by UrtheCast Corp. (TSX:UR), which owns them.
The cameras were launched to the space station in November in a deal between UrtheCast and the Russian Space Agency. UrtheCast is to post video on its website and sell images.
In a news release, UrtheCast said following the installation, the company would begin calibrating the cameras in preparation for the debut of its Ultra HD video of Earth.
--With files from The Canadian Press
News from © The Associated Press, 2014