Station Mir

Mir following separation from the Space Shuttle Discovery, June 12, 1998
Station statistics
NSSDC ID:	1986-017A
Call sign:	Mir
Crew:	3
Launch:	1986-02-19 21:28:23 UTC
Launch pad:	LC-200/39, and LC-81/23, Baikonur Cosmodrome, USSR
Reentry:	2001-03-23 05:50:00 UTC
Mass:	124,340 kg (274,123 lbs)
Living volume:	350 m³
Perigee:	386 km (207.9 nmi)[dubious – discuss]
Apogee:	398 km (212.5 nmi)[dubious – discuss]
Orbit inclination:	51.6 degrees
Orbital period:	89.8 minutes
Orbits per day:	16.13
Days in orbit:	5,519 days
Days occupied:	4,592 days
Distance travelled:	3,638,470,307 km (1,964,616,800 nmi)
Statistics as of Deorbit on 2001-03-23[citation needed].
Configuration
Final configuration of Mir, with docked Space Shuttle
Station Mir

Mir (Russian: Мир, Russian for either Peace or World) was a Soviet (and later Russian) orbital station. Mir was the world's first consistently inhabited long-term research station in space, and the first 'third generation' type space station, constructed over a number of years with a modular design.

Mir holds the record for longest continuous human presence in space at eight days short of 10 years, and, through a number of collaborations, was made internationally accessible to cosmonauts and astronauts of many countries (program Intercosmos). The most notable of these, the Shuttle-Mir Program, saw American Space Shuttles visiting the station eleven times, bringing supplies and providing crew rotation. Mir was assembled in orbit by successively connecting several modules, each launched separately from 1986 to 1996.

The station existed until 23 March 2001, when it was deliberately de-orbited, breaking apart during atmospheric re-entry over the South Pacific Ocean.

Development

Mir Base Block with the five ports in a spherical node at the station’s forward end (left)

Zvezda Service Module under construction. Sister to the Mir Core and originally to be the core of Mir 2

Early existence

Leonid Kizim and Vladimir Solovyov first docked with the Mir space station on March 15, 1986. During their nearly 51-day stay on Mir, they brought the station online and checked its systems. They also unloaded two Progress spacecraft launched after their arrival, Progress-25 and Progress-26.^[2]

Mir's configuration after the arrival of Kvant-1 in 1987

The second expedition to Mir, Mir EO-2, launched on Soyuz TM-2 on February 5, 1987. During their stay, the Kvant-1 module was launched on March 30, 1987. It was the first, experimental version of a planned series of '37K' modules scheduled to be launched to Mir on the Soviet Buran space shuttle. Kvant-1 was originally planned to dock with Salyut 7; however, due to technical problems during its development, it was reassigned for Mir. The module carried the first set of six gyroscopes for attitude control. The module also carried instruments for X-ray and ultraviolet astrophysical observation.

Further information: Kvant-1

Mir with Kvant-1 module and Soyuz TM-3

The Soyuz TM-2 launch was the beginning of a string of 6 Soyuz launches and three long-duration crews between February 5, 1987 and April 27, 1989. This time period also saw the first international visitors to the station, Muhammed Faris, Abdul Ahad Mohmand and Jean-Loup Chrétien. With the departure of Mir EO-4 on Soyuz TM-7 April 27, 1989 the station was once again left unoccupied.

First expansion phase

Further information: Kvant-2

Mir following the arrival of Kvant-2 in 1989.

Mir's configuration after the arrival of Kristall in 1990

The Kristall module contained a number of furnaces for the creation of crystals in micro-gravity. Also on board was biotechnology research equipment, including a small greenhouse for plant cultivation experiments. The unit was equipped with a source of light and a feeding system. The module also contained equipment for astronomy observations. The main feature, however, was the two APAS-89 Androgynous Peripheral Attach System docking ports designed to be compatible with the Buran shuttle. Although they were never used with a Buran Shuttle, they were later used with the American Space Shuttle.^[9]

Further information: Kristall

International cooperation

Mir is seen orbiting about 350 kilometres above New Zealand.

Main article: Shuttle-Mir Program

In September 1993 U.S. Vice-President Al Gore and Russian prime minister Viktor Chernomyrdin announced plans for a new space station, which would later be called the International Space Station, or ISS. They also agreed that, in preparation for this new project, the U.S. would be involved in the Mir project in the years ahead, under the code name Phase One (the ISS being Phase Two). Space shuttles would take part in the transport of supplies and people to and from Mir, and American astronauts would live on Mir for many months on end, allowing the U.S. to share and learn from the unique experience that Russia had with long duration space flights.

The U.S. involvement in the Mir program also brought new funds to Mir. The most notable use of these was the completion and launch of the Spektr and Priroda modules. Also, the Mir Docking Module was constructed to make the process of docking the shuttle to the station easier.

The American Space Shuttle Atlantis docked to the Russian Mir Space Station

Starting in March 1995, seven U.S. astronauts spent 28 months on Mir. During their stay several acute emergencies occurred, notably a small fire on February 23, 1997, and a collision with an unmanned Progress spacecraft on June 25, 1997. The latter left a hole in the Spektr module, which was then sealed off from the rest of the station. On both occasions the necessity for complete evacuation using the Soyuz escape craft was narrowly avoided. Several space walks were needed to restore full power to Mir, and one of these was inside the Spektr module from which all the air had escaped. After the emergencies, the U.S. Congress and NASA considered whether the U.S. should abandon the program out of concern for the astronauts' safety, but NASA administrator Daniel S. Goldin decided to continue the program.

In June 1998, the final U.S. Mir astronaut Andy Thomas left the station aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery.

Mir was originally planned to be followed by a Mir 2, and elements of that project are now an integral part of the International Space Station, including the core module (now called Zvezda) which was labeled as "Mir-2" for quite some time in the factory.

Life on Mir

Mir and the Moon, two satellites of the Earth

Inside, the 100-ton Mir looked like a cramped labyrinth, crowded with hoses, cables and scientific instruments — as well as articles of everyday life, such as photos, children's drawings, books and a guitar. It commonly housed three crew members, but it sometimes supported as many as six for up to a month. Except for two short periods, Mir was continuously occupied until August 1999.

Air aboard the station has been described as 'very healthy, - it's not dry, it's not humid. Nothing smells.' by NASA astronaut John Blaha. He also describes that with the exception of the Priroda and Spektr which were added very recently, the station does look used, which is to be expected given it has been lived in for 10 to 11 years without being brought home and cleaned.^[13]

During the Shuttle-Mir Program, Russian cosmonauts were tasked with station upkeep and maintenance while the American Astronauts conducted scientific experiment operations in the areas of human physiology, life science, microbiology, and materials science.^[13]

Astronaut Shannon Lucid, who set the record for longest stay in space by a woman while aboard Mir (surpassed by Sunita Williams 11 years later on the ISS), also commented about working aboard Mir saying "I think going to work on a daily basis on Mir is very similar to going to work on a daily basis on an outstation in Antarctica. The big difference with going to work here is the isolation, because you really are isolated. You don't have a lot of support from the ground. You really are on your own."^[13]

Two amateur radio call signs, U1MIR and U2MIR, were assigned to Mir in the late 1980s, allowing amateur radio operators on Earth to communicate with the cosmonauts.^[14]

Peter Llewellyn almost visited Mir in 1999 after promising US$100 million for the privilege.^[15]

Final days and deorbit

Mir space station breaking up in Earth's atmosphere over the South Pacific on March 23, 2001.

Near the end of its life, there were plans for private interests to purchase Mir, possibly for use as the first orbital television/movie studio. The privately-funded Soyuz TM-30 mission by MirCorp, launched on April 4, 2000, carried two crew members, Sergei Zalyotin and Alexandr Kaleri, to the station for two months to do repair work with the hope of proving that the station could be made safe. But this was to be the last manned mission to Mir. While Russia was optimistic about Mir's future, its commitments to the International Space Station project left no funding to support the aging Mir.

Mir's deorbit was done in three stages. The first stage was waiting for atmospheric drag to decay Mir’s orbit an average of 220 kilometers (137 mi). This began with the docking of Progress M1-5, a modified version of the Progress M carrying 2.5 times more fuel in place of supplies. The second stage was the transfer of the station into a 165 x 220 km (103 x 137 mi) orbit. This was achieved with two burns of the Progress M1-5's control engines at 00:32 UTC and 02:01 UTC on March 23, 2001. After a two-orbit pause, the third and final stage of Mir's deorbit began with the burn of Progress M1-5's control engines and main engine at 05:08 UTC, lasting a little over 22 minutes. Reentry into Earth's atmosphere (100 km/60 mi) of the 15-year-old space station occurred at 05:44 UTC near Nadi, Fiji. Major destruction of the station began around 05:52 UTC and the unburned fragments fell into the South Pacific Ocean around 06:00 UTC.^{[16] [17]}

In anticipation of the reentry of Mir, the owners of Taco Bell towed a large target out into the Pacific Ocean. If the target was hit by a falling piece of Mir, every person in the United States would be entitled to a free Taco Bell taco. The company bought a sizable insurance policy for this "gamble."^[18] No piece of the station struck the target.

NASA created an animation of the Mir deorbit.

Support craft

A Space Shuttle Atlantis out-the-window view showing a Soyuz spacecraft docked with Mir

The Mir space station was primarily supported by the Russian Soyuz and Progress spacecraft. Soyuz craft provided manned access to and from the station, allowing for crew rotations. Soyuz craft also functioned as a lifeboat for the station, allowing for a relatively quick return to earth in the event of an emergency. The unmanned Progress cargo vehicles were only used to resupply the station and were incapable of surviving reentry.

A view of the Space Shuttle Atlantis departing the Mir.

It was anticipated that it would also be the destination for flights by the later-abandoned Buran space shuttle. The Kristall module even carried two APAS-89 Androgynous Peripheral Attach System docking ports designed to be compatible with the Buran shuttle. These were later used with the American Space Shuttle.

During the Shuttle-Mir Program, Mir was also supported by Space Shuttles, allowing American and other western astronauts to visit or stay long-term on the station. The visiting US shuttles used a modified docking collar originally designed for the Soviet Buran shuttle, mounted on a bracket originally designed for use with Space Station Freedom. A Docking Module was later added to the end of Kristall to eliminate the need to move the module and retract solar arrays for clearance issues. The shuttles provided crew rotation of the U.S. astronauts on station as well as carrying cargo to and from the station, performing some of the largest transfers of cargo of the time. With a space shuttle docked to Mir the temporary enlargements of living and working areas amounted to a complex that was the largest spacecraft in history at that time, with a combined mass of 275 short tons (249 t).

Mir modules

The Mir space station was constructed by connecting seven different modules, each launched into orbit separately by a Proton rocket, except for the Docking Module, which was brought to Mir by a Space Shuttle.

Module	Launch Date	Launch vehicle	Docking Date	Mass	Soyuz	Purpose	Isolated view	Mir Configuration	Photo
Core	February 19, 1986	Proton 8K82K	N/A	20,100 kg (44,313 lb)	N/A	Main station living quarters, core of entire station to which all other modules were docked.
Kvant-1	March 31, 1987	Proton 8K82K	~April 9, 1987	10,000 kg (22,046 lb)	TM-2	Astronomical observations and Material Science experiments.
Kvant-2	November 26, 1989	Proton 8K82K	December 6, 1989	19,640 kg (43,299 lb)	TM-8	Newer, more sophisticated life support systems, extra scientific experiments and an airlock.
Kristall	May 31, 1990	Proton 8K82K	June 10, 1990	19,640 kg (43,299 lb)	TM-9	Technology, material processing, geophysics and astrophysics laboratory.
Spektr	May 20, 1995	Proton 8K82K	June 1, 1995	19,640 kg (43,299 lb)	TM-21	Housed experiments for the Shuttle-Mir Program.
Docking Module	November 12, 1995	Space Shuttle Atlantis (STS-74)	November 15, 1995	6,134 kg (13,523 lb)	TM-22	Used as a docking port for the American Space Shuttle during the Shuttle-Mir Program.
Priroda	April 23, 1996	Proton 8K82K	April 26, 1996	19,000 kg (41,888 lb)	TM-23	Remote Earth sensing module.

Expeditions, spacewalks and crews

• List of Mir Expeditions
• List of Mir spacewalks
• List of spacecraft and crews that visited Mir

Manned spaceflights to Mir in chronological order Soyuz T-15 · TM-2 · TM-3 · TM-4 · TM-5 · TM-6 · TM-7 · TM-8 · TM-9 · TM-10 · TM-11 · TM-12 · TM-13 · TM-14 · TM-15 · TM-16 · TM-17 · TM-18 · TM-19 · TM-20 · STS-63 · TM-21 · STS-71 · TM-22 · STS-74 · TM-23 · STS-76 · TM-24 · STS-79 · STS-81 · TM-25 · STS-84 · TM-26 · STS-86 · STS-89 · TM-27 · STS-91 · TM-28 · TM-29 · TM-30

See also: List of spacewalks and Kerim Kerimov

Further reading

Mir's Legacy - The core modules of the International Space Station, Phase Two of the ISS program.

The story of Phase One is described in great detail by Bryan Burrough in his book Dragonfly:NASA and the Crisis Aboard Mir.

In popular culture

• The station plays a prominent role as a refueling depot in the 1998 film Armageddon. Shown larger than its real life counterpart and referred to simply as the "Russian Space Station," it was destroyed in the film following a fuel leak.
• The station serves a minor role as a refuge for S.R. Hadden in the 1997 film adaptation of Contact.
• Businessman Peter Llewellyn almost got a ride on Mir in 1999 after promising US$100 million for the privilege. ^[15]
• In the fictional game setting World of Darkness by White Wolf Publishing, Mir is the site of a Black Spiral Dancer Caern, serving as a direct portal to Malfeas.
• In the South Park episode "Pinkeye", Kenny's first death in the episode results from Mir crashing onto him. All the people inside also have died as well during the crashing. The episode originally aired about 3 ½ years before the actual de-orbiting.
• In The Simpsons episode "The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace", Homer has a flashback of himself sabotaging Mir^[19], and in "The Great Money Caper" the Simpsons family car is hit by a sturgeon from the space station ^[20].
• In the 1999 movie Virus, an alien lifeform invades Mir.
• In the short story "Above it All" by Robert J. Sawyer an American astronaut boards Mir to recover the corpse of a Russian cosmonaut.
• In the User Friendly comic strip, Erwin, an Artificial Intelligence program, was transferred to and inhabited Mir for a period of time.
• In the BBC sci-fi series Bugs, footage of the Mir space station was used to depict a space based laser cannon.
• In Showtime's series Dead Like Me, the protagonist of the show, George, was killed by a toilet seat that fell from the de-orbiting Mir.
• In Fallen Angels (Pournelle/Niven/Barnes), Mir and the then-proposed American space station Freedom have combined to create a single habitat for the break-away culture of astronauts and cosmonauts.
• In the Fallout Tactics, a postnuclear tactical role-playing game, wreck of the station appears as an easter egg in a special encounter.
• In Red Alert 3, Soviets can dump a Mir-like orbital station on their enemies.
• In the chilean film ChilePuede, about a probably chilean space mission, an alcoholic russian scientist call to his cosmonaut nephew who is in the MIR, to help and save the disastrous mission. The scientist explain: the space station had many modules, and not all were destroyed, and, in the case of a new cold war, the russians may be ready.

References

21. * http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4225/nasa4/nasa4.htm

22. * http://www.cnn.com/TECH/9706/25/mir.escape/index.html

23. * http://www.jinformation.com/literature/events-international-apr-18-1997.htm

24. * http://www.anomalies.net/archive/cni-news/CNI.0751.html

Sources

• Mir Hardware Heritage - NASA report (PDF format)
• Mir Mission Chronicle - NASA report (PDF format)
• Mir-Shuttle:Phase 1 Program Joint Report (PDF format)
• Soviet Space Stations as Analogs - NASA report (PDF format)

External links

• Mir Diary
• Site contains detailed diagrams, pictures and background info
• Site describes the Mir-Shuttle Docking Module
• Site contains information on problems aboard Mir
• Screensaver realistically shows Mir construction

Components of Space Station Mir Soviet modules Core Module · Kvant-1 · Kvant-2 · Kristall American-financed modules Spektr · Docking Module · Priroda Other subsystems Lyappa arm · APAS-89 · Altair/SR relay satellites Support craft Soyuz · Progress · Space Shuttle (during Shuttle-Mir Program)

Soviet and Russian government manned space programs Active Soyuz • ISS (joint) Spaceflight portal In development Kliper Past Vostok • Voskhod • Soyuz • Salyut • Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (joint) • Mir • Shuttle-Mir Program (joint) Cancelled Zond (lunar Soyuz 7K-L1) • N1-L3 (Moon landing program) • TMK (Mars flyby program) • Spiral • Almaz (incorporated into Salyut program) / TKS spacecraft • Energia / Buran

United States government human spaceflight programs Active Space Shuttle · ISS (joint) · Project Constellation (future) Spaceflight portal Previous X-15 (suborbital) · Mercury · Gemini · Apollo · Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (with USSR) · Skylab · Shuttle-Mir (with Russia) Canceled MISS · Orion (nuclear) · Dyna-Soar · Manned Orbital Laboratory · National Aero-Space Plane · Space Station Freedom (now ISS) · Orbital Space Plane

Space stations and habitats Active International Space Station (ISS) · Genesis I and II (private) Spaceflight portal Defunct Salyut (incorporating Almaz) · Skylab · Mir Cancelled Manned Orbital Laboratory · Skylab B · Almaz · Polyus · Galaxy (private) ISS-incorporated Space Station Freedom · Columbus · Mir-2 Developmental by country Project 921-2 (China) private Sundancer · BA 330 · Galactic Suite Proposed Rotating wheel · Bernal sphere · O'Neill cylinder · Stanford torus · Wet workshop · Space habitat · Industrial Space Facility

Shuttle-Mir Program Main articles Shuttle-Mir Program · Mir · Space Shuttle Missions STS-60 · STS-63 · Soyuz TM-21 · STS-71 · STS-74 · STS-76 · STS-79 · STS-81 · STS-84 · STS-86 · STS-89 · STS-91 Increments Thagard · Lucid · Blaha · Linenger · Foale · Wolf · Thomas

Spaceflight General spaceflight History (Space Race, Accidents and incidents) · Astrodynamics · Lists and timelines Applications Earth observation satellites (Spy satellites, weather satellites) · Space exploration · Space tourism · Communication satellites · Satellite navigation · Space colonization Human spaceflight General Astronaut  · Life support system Hazards Weightlessness (space adaptation syndrome)  · cosmic radiation Major projects Vostok · Mercury · Voskhod · Gemini · Soyuz · Apollo · Space Shuttle · Shenzhou · Mir · ISS · Constellation Other Extra-vehicular activity Spacecraft Launch vehicle · Space Shuttle · Robotic spacecraft · Self-replicating spacecraft · Spacecraft propulsion · Rocket Destinations Sub-orbital · Orbital (Geosynchronous orbit, Geocentric orbit)  · Interplanetary spaceflight · Interstellar travel · Intergalactic travel Space launch Expendable and Reusable systems · Escape velocity · Direct ascent · Non-rocket spacelaunch · Spaceport · Launch pad Main agencies ESA · NASA  · RKA  · CNSA · ISRO · JAXA Other Private spaceflight · Space weather · Lagrangian point · Space and survival

Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia; from the article "Mir". Image Credit.

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