Astronauts Install Final Solar Array, Completing ISS Power Upgrade

Two astronauts have finished the job they set out to do above Earth, installing the eighth and final roll-out solar array on the International Space Station and completing a power upgrade that began more than five years ago.

NASA confirmed the installation on Thursday, 5 November, after NASA astronaut Anil Menon and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Joshua Kutryk spent six hours and 59 minutes working outside the station. The pair concluded the spacewalk at 3:35 p.m. Eastern Time, having deployed the last of the station’s new solar wings on the 3B power channel.

The finished system lifts the station’s power-generating capacity from 160 kilowatts to about 215 kilowatts, a gain NASA describes as about 30 percent. NationWire previewed the outing before the astronauts left the airlock, when the outcome still depended on a flawless day of work in orbit.

Seven hours outside the station

The spacewalk began at 8:36 a.m. Eastern Time, when Menon and Kutryk left the Quest airlock. It was the 101st US spacewalk from the station and the 286th in support of station assembly, maintenance and upgrades.

Inside the station, NASA astronauts Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney supported the pair, helping them into and out of their spacesuits, monitoring the excursion and operating the Canadarm2 robotic arm.

The work followed a familiar sequence. The astronauts unfolded the rolled-up array, bolted both halves in place, connected four electrical cables during the station’s passage through Earth’s shadow, when no current was flowing through the neighbouring legacy wing, and then released the final restraints. The array unrolled to its full 63-foot length, and mission control confirmed it was generating power.

“With this, we have finalized the installation of eight solar arrays, a process that began more than 15 years ago,” Menon said once the work was done. “We got it done!”

The final wing and the 3B channel

The last array went onto the 3B power channel on the station’s starboard truss. The location sits beyond the reach of Canadarm2, so the astronauts passed the rolled-up array between foot restraints to move it into position.

The mounting bracket for the 3B site was itself only installed during a preparatory spacewalk in March 2026, specifically to receive this final array. TechTimes reported the sequence was choreographed across the two spacewalks, with the seventh array installed on 29 October and the eighth following a week later.

Each roll-out array, known as an IROSA, measures about 60 feet long by 20 feet wide once unfurled. The wings are far smaller than the station’s original solar panels, yet each produces a similar amount of power, making up for energy lost as the older wings degraded.

Why the station needs more power

The station runs on sunlight, and its power system has been asked to do more as research, commercial activity and life-support demands have grown. The original solar arrays, launched in the station’s early years, have gradually lost efficiency with age and exposure to the space environment.

The extra capacity supports experiments, life-support systems and the station’s final years of operation. The station is planned to be retired in 2030 with a safe, controlled deorbit, and the upgrade supports critical operations through those final years rather than extending its life indefinitely.

The upgrade also feeds into wider American space ambitions. It comes days after a US space proclamation pledging a Moon return by 2028, and the station remains a test bed for the skills, hardware and endurance that longer missions will require.

A five-year upgrade, finished

Work to augment the station’s power generation began in February 2021, when astronauts first started installing the new roll-out arrays alongside the ageing original wings. Pairs of arrays were added over successive years as hardware arrived on cargo missions.

The final pair of outings closed that chapter. On 29 October, the same two astronauts spent seven hours and 11 minutes outside the station installing the seventh array, an outing counted as the 100th United States spacewalk. Thursday’s excursion was the ninth spacewalk of 2026.

For Kutryk, a Royal Canadian Air Force colonel and test pilot, it was his second spacewalk; for Menon, his fifth. Kutryk arrived at the station on 1 October as part of the Crew-13 mission, and he became the first Canadian to walk in space since David Saint-Jacques in 2019 during the October outing.

What comes next

With all eight roll-out arrays active, the station’s power system is now complete in the form NASA planned. The agency says the additional power will support scientific research and station operations, including the controlled deorbit planned for the end of the decade.

The spacewalk closes a long-running piece of orbital construction: a station that can now generate about a third more power than before the upgrade began.