The fifth and final spacewalk is over

Tomorrow (Monday) the shuttle Endeavor is expected to detach from the space station and begin its journey towards Earth

Astronauts Robert Behnken and Mick Furman completed the fifth and final spacewalk on mission STS-123 on Saturday, at 22:36 PM EST (04:36 AM Israel Time). Rick Linneman coordinated their activities in space from the combined space station and shuttle Endeavor complex.

Using the station's robotic arm, the crew inside the station moved the sensor system used as an extension of the shuttle's Orbiter Boom Sensor System (OBSS) robotic arm and handed them over to the spacewalkers who stored them in a storage facility on the outside of the station's S1 component.

The reason for this is the need to make room in the luggage compartment of the space shuttle Discovery which will bring the second and larger part of the Japanese space laboratory Kibo on the next flight, STS-124. The part is too big and needs to be made room for, so it was decided to give up the sensors used to scan the outer part of the space shuttle on the first day of the flight, and instead they will conduct more intensive tests on the space station itself. The Discovery astronauts will install the system left behind by Endeavour, use it to scan the tiles and bring it back home.
After the storage mission was completed, Behnken installed the Materials International Space Station Experiment 6 on the exterior of the European Columbus Laboratory, while Forman tested the rotation engine of the Alpha solar collector.

The spacewalkers also completed tasks that were planned for a later time - including removing the cover from a bump that will be used by future spacewalkers on the Japanese logistics module, and we stored tools in a toolbox on the airlock before closing the gate.

After the completion of the last spacewalk in mission STS-123, the astronauts are expected tomorrow, on the 14th day of the operation, to return to the shuttle Endeavor and finish their visit to the space station. Endeavor will detach from the station on Monday and is expected to land on Wednesday.