CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — A pair of spacewalking astronauts overpowered a stubborn bolt and successfully installed a new piano-sized camera in the Hubble Space Telescope on Thursday, a step to making the observatory better than ever.
“Let there be light,” spacewalker John Gruns feld said as ground controllers checked the power hookups. Grunsfeld and Andrew Feustel also completed other major chores.
The nearly 7 1/2-hour repair job — all the more dangerous because of the high, debris-ridden orbit — got off to a slow and rocky start.
Grunsfeld and Feustel had trouble removing the old camera from the telescope because a bolt was stuck. They fetched extra tools, but none seemed to work.
Finally, Mission Control urged the astronauts to use as much force as possible, even though there was a risk the bolt might break. If that had happened, the old camera would be stuck inside, leaving no room for its souped-up replacement.
“OK, here we go,” Feustel said. “I think I’ve got it. It turned. It definitely turned.” And then: “Woo-hoo, it’s moving out!”
The extra effort paid off but put the astronauts a little behind schedule in their first spacewalk of shuttle Atlantis’ mission.
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