Look: UAE astronaut's spacewalk becomes a visual treat for enthusiasts

Those who closely followed Sultan AlNeyadi’s spacewalk on Friday were also treated to a vicarious space adventure as they saw stunning shots of orbital sunrises and sunsets taken from the spacewalking astronauts’ Helca (helmet camera).

The International Space Station (ISS) orbits the Earth once every 90 minutes, and AlNeyadi and Bowen were able to experience a sunrise and a sunset every 45 minutes during their almost seven-hour spacewalk.

The public saw how astronauts worked in sunlight for 45 minutes, and in stark darkness with lights coming only from their helmets. The temperatures also varied from freezing cold minus 121ºC to extreme heat at 121ºC in the sunlight — which was almost three times the temperature during summer in the UAE. They saw how astronauts were protected by spacesuits that were designed like a miniature spaceship (shaped in human body).

AlNeyadi, together with Hazzaa AlMansoori, trained at Nasa's Johnson Space Centre’s Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory (NBL) in Houston for months to get familiar with microgravity and execute this historic spacewalk — the first for the Arab world.

Take a look at some of the stunning shots in the sky:

• 'Wish us luck': AlNeyadi ready to 'write history for Arabs', tweets ahead of spacewalk