NEWS CONFERENCE SET FOR U.S. ASTRONAUT ON MIR



May 28, 1998



Debbie Rahn/Jennifer McCarter
Headquarters, Washington, DC
(Phone: 202/358-1639)



Rob Navias
Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX
(Phone: 281/483-3671)

<h4>Release: N98-37</h4> <h3>News Conference Set for U.S. Astronaut on 
Mir</h3> 

U.S. Astronaut Andrew Thomas will hold a news conference from the Mir 
Space Station on Monday, June 1, starting at about 9:40 a.m. CDT to 
discuss the end of his four-month research mission on the Russian 
complex and the upcoming end of the Shuttle-Mir program.



The news conference, to be broadcast on NASA Television on the eve of 
the launch of Discovery on the STS-91 mission to bring Thomas home, 
is expected to last about 30 minutes. There will be multicenter 
question-and-answer capability for reporters at participating NASA 
centers.



The news conference will be carried through the Russian Altair 
satellite to be transmitted to the U.S. from the Russian Mission 
Control Center in Korolev, outside Moscow.



Thomas is wrapping up the final flight of a U.S. astronaut to Mir. If 
he lands on June 12 as is currently scheduled, American astronauts 
will have spent almost 1000 days in space over the past three years 
as part of the Shuttle-Mir program.



NASA Television is carried on GE-2, Transponder 9C at 85 degrees West 
longitude, vertical polarization, frequency 3880 Mhz, audio 6.8 Mhz.

	
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