Space station pump fixed after two spacewalks

During a spacewalk, NASA astronaut Rick Mastracchio helps to identify the problem with a faulty coolant pump on the International Space Station.

NASA

After two spacewalks, astronauts on the International Space Station have repaired a degraded pump that removes excess heat from the earth-orbiting spacecraft. The fix let the crew restore power to labs, experiments and other electrical components on the space station.

Ashley Yeager is the associate news editor at Science News. She has worked at The Scientist, the Simons Foundation, Duke University and the W.M. Keck Observatory, and was the web producer for Science News from 2013 to 2015. She has a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and a master’s degree in science writing from MIT.