ISS crew complete spacewalk

MOSCOW, June 10 (Xinhua) -- Two crew members of the International Space Station (ISS) on Wednesday have successfully completed the second spacewalk conducted in this month, and have returned to the station, said the Mission Control Center outside Moscow.

During the 37-minute spacewalk starting at 10:55 a.m. Moscow time (0655 GMT), Russian Commander Gennady Padalka and U.S. Flight Engineer

Michael Barratt successfully installed a cone-shaped docking component onto the Zvezda (Star) service module, Valery Lyndin, spokesman for the Mission Control Center said.

The two space walkers also took pictures of the ISS exterior.

Both spacewalks conducted in first half of June were aimed to install necessary equipment outside the Zvezda service module for the docking of Russia's small research module MIM-2, a space vehicle due to blast off in autumn, Lyndin said.

MIM-2 is a multifunctional module used for docking Russian Soyuz and Progress spaceships to the ISS. It will also take over some functions of the Zvezda service module.

Russia's new Orlan-MK spacesuits, which the two astronauts were wearing, functioned well during the spacewalk.

Padalka and Barratt installed three antennae for the Kurs auto-docking system to receive MIM-2 on June 5 in a nearly five-hour spacewalk.

Three astronauts joined the three crew members already on board the space station in late May and formed a six-member permanent crew for the first time.