Shuttle crew completes last spacewalk of flight

Houston, June 18: Astronauts put the final touches on a new solar power unit for the International Space Station yesterday in their last spacewalk before the scheduled departure of the shuttle Atlantis on Tuesday.

Still to come today is a test to make sure the space station's guidance system is in good shape after a computer crash last week.

During a 6-1/2 hour spacewalk, Atlantis crewmembers Patrick Forrester and Steven Swanson set up a rotary joint for a new array of solar panels that will enable them to track the sun.

The wing-like panels, which will generate additional electricity for the station, were installed last week during the first spacewalk of Atlantis' 13-day flight.

During installation, the space station's primary computer network crashed, raising concerns that the half-finished 100 billion dollars outpost would have to be temporarily abandoned.

The computers control steering rockets that help keep the station in the proper position. The shuttle, which docked with the complex on June 10, was using its jets to perform that task while the computers were down.

The computers were revived over the weekend and today will be tested to see if they are ready to once again keep the station stable.

''We're confident it's going to work but it will be a good double check to make sure everything's in the proper configuration,'' said space station flight director Kelly Beck at the Johnson Space Center.

The shuttle has enough supplies to stay at the outpost until Wednesday if any problems arise but is currently scheduled to leave the station on Tuesday and return to Kennedy Space Center on Thursday.

The computer malfunction is believed to have been caused by an electrical problem.

A European module and cargo ship scheduled to go to the station later have the same computer system, so investigations are under way to determine whether changes need to be made before they are launched, the European Space Agency said in a statement.

NASA, the US space agency, hopes to complete the station with at least 12 more shuttle flights before the aging shuttle fleet is retired in 2010.

Reuters

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