Live coverage: Three-man crew closes out 173-day space mission

Space station commander Jeff Williams and astronaut Kate Rubins plan to carry out their second spacewalk in two weeks Thursday, venturing back outside to retract a cooling radiator, install a high-definition TV camera, replace a burned-out light and inspect struts attached to a large solar array rotary mechanism.

Five days after work to replace the grapple fitting on one end of the space station’s robot arm, commander Randy Bresnik and flight engineer Mark Vande Hei ventured back outside the lab complex Tuesday to lubricate the new arm mechanism, to replace a degraded camera and to carry out a variety of lower-priority chores.

The threat from Hurricane Nicole churning toward a tracking station in Bermuda will keep Orbital ATK’s Antares rocket from launching on a space station cargo run until at least Sunday, officials said Tuesday.