Debra Rahn
Headquarters, Washington, DC                   January 13, 1998
(Phone:  202/358-1639)

Edward Campion
Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX
(Phone:  281/483-5111)

NOTE TO EDITORS:  N98-2

NASA TV PLANS COVERAGE OF MIR SPACEWALK

     The scheduled spacewalk outside the Russian space station Mir 
by U.S. astronaut David Wolf and Mir 24 Commander Anatoly Solovyev 
will be covered on NASA Television on Wednesday, Jan. 14.  NASA 
Television coverage will begin at approximately 3:30 p.m. EST.

     The spacewalk, which is scheduled to begin at approximately 
3:45 p.m. EST, is expected to last about three hours and is 
designed to operate a portable spectrometer outside Mir to measure 
the effect of the space environment on a space station structure.  
Wolf will become the third American to conduct a spacewalk in a 
Russian suit outside Mir.  Jerry Linenger was the first U.S. 
astronaut to conduct a Russian spacewalk last April and Mike Foale 
ventured outside with Solovyev last September.

     Plans call for limited commentary during the spacewalk, 
translation of the Russian air-to-ground communications by Wolf 
and Solovyev as they talk to Russian ground controllers, and any 
available television which may be downlinked during the operation.  
Currently, the cosmonauts have no plans to downlink TV during the 
spacewalk.  A short briefing by NASA Phase One Deputy Program 
Manager James Van Laak, Greg Harbaugh, the acting director of the 
Extravehicular Activity Projects Office, and Mike Hess, EVA 
Officer at the Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX, will follow the 
spacewalk at about 7 p.m. EST.  It will be broadcast on NASA 
Television with multicenter question and answer capability 
available. 

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

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