DATE=4/16/02

TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT

TITLE=STATION SPACEWALK (S)

NUMBER=2-288778

BYLINE=DAVID MCALARY

DATELINE=WASHINGTON

CONTENT=

INTERNET=

VOICED AT:

INTRO: U-S astronauts are on another spacewalk, working on the new international space station. David McAlary reports.

TEXT: The outing is a return engagement for the first pair of spacewalking grandfathers, 54-year-old Jerry Ross and 49-year-old Lee Morin. They performed the second of the mission Saturday.

The crewmen are wrapping up some minor tasks on a girder that was mounted on the station's U-S lab last week.

The 13-meter beam is the first of nine sections that will eventually extend more than 100-meters to hold nearly half a hectare of solar panels and cooling radiators for future Japanese and European labs.

Working under powerful halogen lamps, the team is installing handrails on the girder, relocating tools for spacewalks on the next shuttle visit in May, and adjusting a thermal blanket partly obstructing an antenna.

This is the ninth spacewalk of astronaut Ross's career, a U-S space agency record. The mission is his seventh in orbit, a world record. (SIGNED)

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