Watch 2 Russian cosmonauts spacewalk outside the ISS today

Roscosmos Spacewalk 65 - YouTube

A pair of cosmonauts will work outside the International Space Station today (Oct. 28), and you can watch the off-Earth action live.

closeup of a spacewalking astronaut's helmet and torso, with earth in the background — Russian cosmonaut Alexander Skvortsov performs a spacewalk in support of science and maintenance on the International Space Station on Aug. 18, 2014. (Image credit: NASA)

The duo "will install experiment hardware on the Nauka Multipurpose Laboratory Module, and relocate a control panel for the European robotic arm attached to Nauka," NASA News Chief Cheryl Warner wrote in an emailed statement on Monday (Oct. 27).

Most of NASA's activities are on hold due to the ongoing government shutdown, but the agency will stream today's spacewalk "and provide minimal technical commentary as this activity relates to excepted mission operations," Warner wrote.

This will be the second spacewalk in less than two weeks for Ryzhikov, who commands the International Space Station's current Expedition 73, and flight engineer Zubritsky. The duo also performed an extravehicular activity on Oct. 16, installing a semiconductor experiment on the orbiting lab and jettisoning an old HDTV camera.

Today's spacewalk will be the third for Ryzhikov, who will wear a spacesuit with red stripes, and the second for for Zubritsky, whose suit will have blue stripes, according to Warner.

It will be the 277th overall spacewalk in the history of the ISS, which has hosted rotating astronaut crews continuously since Nov. 2, 2000.

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Michael Wall is a Senior Space Writer with Space.com and joined the team in 2010. He primarily covers exoplanets, spaceflight and military space, but has been known to dabble in the space art beat. His book about the search for alien life, "Out There," was published on Nov. 13, 2018. Before becoming a science writer, Michael worked as a herpetologist and wildlife biologist. He has a Ph.D. in evolutionary biology from the University of Sydney, Australia, a bachelor's degree from the University of Arizona, and a graduate certificate in science writing from the University of California, Santa Cruz. To find out what his latest project is, you can follow Michael on Twitter.

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