Watch Canada's robot space arm reorganize the ISS in 12 sec

Wednesday, May 27, 2015, 5:25 PM - It was "Moving Day" on the International Space Station on Wednesday, and the crew had the capable "hand" of Canada's robotic space arm to do all the heavy lifting.

At 8:45 a.m. EDT, Wednesday, May 27, the Canadarm2 sprung into action, rearranging the configuration of the International Space Station, to pave the way for the future of commercial spaceflight.

NASA Astronaut Terry Virts, currently in command of the space station, captured this time-lapse video of the entire procedure, shortening it to just 12 seconds of footage.

What's Going On?

In the not-to-distant future, the space station will be receiving a new batch of commercial spacecraft, delivering supplies and ferrying crew members from Earth and back.

Astronauts Barry Wilmore and Terry Virts already laid some of the "ground work" for this, by performing three spacewalks earlier this year. During those procedures, they set up the hardware for two new docking collars the station will install to accommodate these spacecraft.

The next step in this was to change the configuration of the station, to make it easier for them to dock and undock.

That's where the Canadarm2 came in.

Just as this robotic arm helped to build the station, it was now used to pick up the Permanent Multipurpose Module, nicknamed Leonardo, and move it to a more advantageous location.

Below is a schematic showing the old configuration of the PMM compared to its new location (in yellow).

Credit: NASA, with edits by author

The procedure took a total of about 90 minutes, with the slow pace necessary to avoid any possible problems or accidents. Despite that, it is always fascinating to see this marvel of Canadian technology at work.

Sources: NASA TV | CSA