"The commander and the flight engineer have returned to the Pirs docking module, brought in their equipment, then Lopez-Alegria and Tyurin entered the station and closed the hatch," the mission control said.

The crewmen accomplished their tasks, although they were unable to fold away an antenna on the Progress M58 cargo spacecraft.

"There is a big scratch on the surface, the internal gear must have been blocked. It cannot be folded. It does not move," Tyurin reported to ground control.

He suggested the antenna, which failed to fold away properly when the supply vehicle docked with the station October 27, got caught on the handles ISS crewmembers use while working on the station's exterior. An initial attempt to dock failed at the time, but a second was successful.

Russia's Mission Control told the astronauts to abandon their attempts to fold away the antenna, but to photograph it.

"Take a picture [of the antenna] and we will think about what to do [with it]," Mission Control said.

The astronauts' extravehicular activity also included a round of golf played as part of an advertising contract with an American sports equipment company.

Lopez-Alegria was on hand with a video and a photographic camera to capture the image of a white ball flying through the interplanetary darkness after Russian cosmonaut Tyurin took a swing.

The ball weighs only three grams, and NASA experts, who earlier opposed the promotional event as potentially dangerous for the station, said it will remain in orbit for about three days before re-entering the Earth's atmosphere and burning up.

Related Links
ISS
Space Station News at Space-Travel.Com

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