Mir-24 Weekly Reports
Mir-24 - Week of August 29, 1997
Mission Status Report - Filed from Mir Mission Control in Moscow
Interview with Jim Van Laak - the Deputy Director of the Shuttle-Mir Phase I Program talks about the current plans for activities onboard the Mir
A week ago today, the Russian cosmonauts on the space station Mir conducted a spacewalk inside their orbiting outpost in an attempt to restore the power it lost after an on-orbit collision with a Progress re-supply ship in late June. Today, astronaut Mike Foale and his Russian crewmates are onboard a station they say is coming back to the condition it was in prior to that collision two months ago.
Last Friday morning, Houston time, Mir-24 commander Anatoly Solovyev and flight engineer Pavel Vinogradov conducted a five-hour spacewalk inside the station's transfer node and the Spektr module, which has been sealed off since it was struck by the unmanned cargo craft. They installed a piece of hardware called a hermaplate in Spektr's hatch, and connected 11 power cables from Spektr's solar arrays to the inside of that hatch.
This week, the Mir crew has been running cables from the outside of Spektr's hatch to batteries in the station's Base Block and to the Kristall and Kvant-2 modules, both of which had been powered down since the collision. In a status report yesterday, Foale praised the work done by his crewmates and said they've all been watching and listening as the systems in Kristall and Kvant-2 have come back to life.
Along with their work to resume operations inside the station, the Mir-24 crew has been preparing for a spacewalk outside the station. Russian mission managers today announced that the spacewalk is being delayed a few days, possibly until next Saturday, to give the crew additional time for on-orbit training and review of procedures.
They had earlier asked that Foale join Solovyev for this excursion to inspect the damage to Spektr. Foale has begun on-orbit training, and a decision from NASA on whether he will make that spacewalk is expected this week.
Today is Foale's 105th day as a crewmember onboard Mir, and the 23rd for Solovyev and Vinogradov. They took over early this month from Mir-23 commander Vasily Tsibliev and flight engineer Aleksandr Lazutkin, with whom Foale worked to bring the station through a series of malfunctions. Foale offered praise for the resourcefulness of his first team of crewmates in noting that the Mir station and its systems are much improved.
One of the things I know has had a lot of interest is the oxygen generation systems onboard the station. We actually have two systems available to us. One is a solid-state system for producing oxygen. We have been using that on and off for the last two or three weeks now. In addition to that we have a system called Elektron, which is a Russian name for a system that does electrolysis of water and breaks it up into hydrogen and oxygen. We throw away the hydrogen in space, and the oxygen we breathe. This system has had some troubles, but on and off has been working and right now behind me there is an Elektron working. We are right now in the activity of establishing another working Elektron in Kvant-2, the other module.
So I would say in summary, things have really started to come back together here on Space Station Mir since the collision. I certainly am starting to feel that conditions are like before the collision, and I'm looking forward to getting some of my final experiments done and some of the experiments I haven't been able to do so far because of the unpowered conditions of the modules. I think this is a great testament to the resourcefulness and the ability of a crew to 'hang in there' working problems even when they are difficult, especially my previous crew, Vasily and Sasha. They worked terribly hard to maintain the condition of the station, and I with them. Pasha and Anatoly also are taking on a big burden to keep the station running and improving. I have seen the station in good condition when I arrived, I saw a low when the collision occurred, and now things are picking up again.
Astronaut David Wolf has returned to the Johnson Space Center following the conclusion of his training at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, in Star City, Russia. This week he completed his final spacewalk training session in the Hydrolab facility there, wearing the Russian Orlan spacesuit, and after Labor Day he will begin final preparations with his STS-86 crewmates for their launch to the Mir, targeted for September 25.
One of those crewmates is astronaut Wendy Lawrence, who had been slated to succeed Mike Foale on the Mir. But her assignment was changed in late July, one month after the Progress collision with Spektr. Both Russian and American mission managers saw the advantage of having any crewmember onboard Mir be qualified as a possible participant in the increased number of spacewalks that may be needed for Mir, but Lawrence is too short to fit in the Russian spacesuit.
In a recent interview Lawrence acknowledged her disappointment at not getting the opportunity to go to the Mir for an extended mission. But she noted that when she was selected for the job more than a year ago, she herself said that she could not fit safely into a Russian spacesuit, and she called Shuttle-Mir program manager Frank Culbertson's decision to send Wolf in her place a wise one.
I was also checked out in their Orlan EVA suit. I went through the standard checks where they pressurize the suit and have you throw switches. They have you go through a range of motion to determine your reach envelope and whether or not you truly do fit the suit. And I myself made the call that I don't fit your EVA suit, even though you shortened it as much as you can, my arms are still too short and I don't fit the suit well enough for me to do an EVA safely. In light of the recent events onboard Mir, the collision of Progress with Spektr and the Russians' desire to fix the Spektr module, there will be a significant number of EVAs in the future, so operationally the decision to replace me with Dave Wolf, who does fit the Russian Orlan suit, I personally think that's a very wise decision operationally. I told that to Frank once the decision had been made. I said, "Frank, I understand. I'm a Commander in the Navy. I've served onboard ships. I've served onboard ships in remote locations, far away from my home squadron, I know the importance of maximizing all your assets, and I think you've done that in this case."
Lawrence remains a member of the Atlantis crew for the upcoming trip to the Mir, and she talked about what she hopes to accomplish during her shorter-than- expected time there, helping Wolf get up to speed on the science agenda of his tour of duty.
It became clear to me that Dave was really going to need some help on orbit getting set up. He's not as familiar with the NASA-6 science program as I am, although he's had training on all the experiments. And I decided that the best contribution that I could make to the STS-86 mission and to the NASA-6 mission would be to get up on orbit, get into the Priroda Module, and unpack all the hardware that Dave'll be using during the duration of his mission, and basically get him set up for his first month of flight. The intent behind my putting everything away for Dave is to give him the opportunity to spend as much time as possible with Mike so he and Mike can get a thorough handover, a thorough tour of Mir, Dave can understand how he needs to operate the systems onboard and interface with them, and I will spend my time in Priroda getting him unpacked and ready to go.
A tentative plan for the activities onboard the Mir, resulting from a teleconference earlier today involving both the American and Russian Shuttle-Mir Program Managers is as follows:
Over the weekend, the Mir-24 crewmembers will continue their on-orbit preparations for the upcoming spacewalk; they will also be taking some time off to rest up for a busy week to come.
On Tuesday, astronaut mike Foale is scheduled to have his first on-orbit spacewalk training while wearing the Russian Orlan spacesuit.
The next step could come on Thursday, September 4--that's the possible date for program managers in Houston and in Moscow to conduct a joint readiness review, the session that will decide a final date for the spacewalk, and a decision on whether Mike Foale gets the "go" to conduct the spacewalk.
If the schedule holds, on Saturday, September 6, Moscow time (late Friday, Houston time) Foale and Mir-24 commander Anatoly Solovyev would exit the Mir station's Kvant-2 airlock for a walk in space to assess the damage to the Spektr Module, and to install handholds for future spacewalks as well as some hardware on the exterior of the Mir's Base Block to accommodate the future installation of an additional carbon dioxide removal system.
If the joint readiness review is conducted this coming Thursday, there will be a briefing for the news media next Thursday at the Johnson Space Center in which Shuttle-Mir program managers will discuss the final plans for the spacewalk.
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Mir
Increment
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Mir-24 - Week of September 5, 1997
Press Briefing, September 4, 1997
The first close-up examination of damage to the outside of the Mir Space Station's Spektr module is now just hours away, as the Mir-24 crew and mission managers in Russia and Houston make final preparations for a spacewalk scheduled to begin just before 8:00 p.m. Friday evening CDT. American astronaut Mike Foale and commander Anatoly Solovyev will perform the EVA.
Since a spacewalk inside the Spektr module two weeks ago, which recovered access to power from the Spektr's solar arrays, power levels on the Mir have been increased and the station's systems have stabilized in proper working order. This past week Foale, Solovyev, and flight engineer Pavel Vinogradov conducted more rehearsals of the tasks to be performed on the external spacewalk to assess the damage from the late June collision with an unmanned Progress re-supply ship.
This Tuesday, those preparations included Foale and Solovyev climbing into their Russian Orlan spacesuits, adjusting them for proper fit, and practicing the various operations while the suit was pressurized. Since the Russians requested Foale's participation in this spacewalk, he has completed 44 hours of on-orbit training, complementing the nearly 150 hours of spacewalk training he completed in Russia prior to his launch last May while he was training as back-up to astronaut Jerry Linenger, his predecessor onboard the Mir.
Yesterday, in a joint readiness review, Russian and American mission managers determined that all the probable risks for this spacewalk had been addressed, and that Solovyev and Foale were fully prepared to make this excursion to the exterior of the Spektr. Foale conducted a four-and-a-half hour spacewalk during his space shuttle mission in 1995; this will be the eleventh spacewalk for Solovyev, including last month's spacewalk inside the station.
As the spacewalk preparations proceed, David Wolf, who will relieve Foale onboard the Mir Space Station, has resumed his shuttle training here in Houston and is now working with his STS-86 shuttle crewmates in final prelaunch activity. The launch date remains targeted for September 25th.
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Mir-24 - Week of September 12, 1997
After almost four full months onboard the Russian space station Mir, American astronaut Mike Foale has begun to turn his attention to a wrap-up of his science agenda and the start of packing for his return to earth early next month. Foale's seventeenth week as a member of the Mir crew was highlighted by a walk in space, when he joined Mir commander Anatoly Solovyev in surveying the damage to the station's Spektr module.
The walk in space lasted for six hours and allowed the first up-close inspection of areas of Spektr that were damaged when the module was struck by an unmanned Progress cargo ship during a docking maneuver on June 25th. Most of the attention was focused around the radiator that was crumpled by the impact, and the base of the solar array that was struck by the cargo craft.
Solovyev reported finding no evidence of a breach in Spektr's hull around the radiator, but measurements showed that the mast of the array was no longer at a right angle to the outer skin of the module, increasing the likelihood of that being the area where a hole may be located. The acting manager of NASA's Spacewalk Project Office, astronaut Greg Harbaugh said that these findings permit investigators to narrow their search for the leak.
It's a process of elimination, in terms of identifying the leak source. One of the most likely areas going into this we thought was impact damage around the radiator and they looked at that extensively, for a couple of hours, and found a number of broken struts, or damaged standoffs, small beams, but didn't find anything that penetrated the hull. So unfortunately, in that sense, we were not able to identify a specific culprit there, but you can deduce from that that is one area they don't need to pursue any further. They also were able to better characterize, and with the video and the still photos that come down we'll have much better information with regard to the base of the damaged solar array. There is some potential that that could be one of the likely candidates that still hasn't been closed out.
Solovyev did manually turn two of the three undamaged solar arrays on Spektr to improve their ability to gather solar energy, and the spacewalkers retrieved a radiation measuring device from the Kvant-2 module that was put in place by astronaut Jerry Linenger during his spacewalk in April. The planned tasks of installing new handholds, and a cap over a valve on the core module to facilitate installation of a new Vozdukh carbon dioxide removal system, were postponed to a subsequent spacewalk.
NASA Shuttle-Mir program officials offered praise to the two spacewalkers, and to the Russian and American teams that worked to devise and execute a spacewalk plan while the principals were already on orbit. Program Manager Frank Culbertson also said that research has already begun into possible alternative methods of locating the source of the leak in Spektr.
Such things as infrared sensors or marker gases. These type of thing are being looked at. There's not enough time to do much in that regard for STS-86, but we are looking for things that we could do for STS-89. The Russians also have an active program in this area, and I think one of the things that this reinforces is the need for this and future stations to have a good reliable means of identifying a hole or a leak after a depressurization that doesn't rely just on visual inspection, because with all the paraphernalia that's installed on the outside of modules, the panels that are on the inside, it'd be very difficult to actually see the pressure hull and see where a hole might be. You need some other way of identifying the location and size and character of that hole.
After getting some rest this past weekend, Foale, Solovyev, and flight engineer Pavel Vinogradov worked to respond to a failure of the central processing unit in the Mir's motion control system computer, which caused the station to lose automatic control of position in relation to the Sun. Once a spare CPU was installed, the motion control computer was rebooted and then the station's gyrodynes restarted; all systems have been working normally since then.
Preparations for the space shuttle mission to retrieve Mike Foale from the Mir are moving ahead on schedule. The current target launch date remains September 25th; the official launch date should be announced after the flight readiness review. The STS-86 crew will begin the final phase of their training at the Johnson Space Center next week.
| 8/29/97 | 9/5/97 | 9/12/97 | 9/19/97 | 9/26/97 | 10/10/97 | 10/17/97 | 10/24/97 |
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Mir-24 - Week of September 19, 1997
Transcript of Mike Foale's Status Report from Mir
After 18 weeks onboard the space station Mir, American astronaut Mike Foale is looking ahead to his final few days as a crewmember on the Russian space station, anticipating next week's scheduled launch of the Space Shuttle Atlantis on the seventh mission to dock with the Mir, bringing astronaut David Wolf to extend the American mission to the Mir into 1998.
Yesterday Foale delivered the final scheduled status report of his four-and-a-half month mission to Mir, and he discussed the spacewalk he made two weeks ago with Mir-24 commander Anatoly Solovyev to survey the damage done to the station's Spektr module when it was struck by an unmanned Progress cargo craft in late June. He noted that no sign of a hull breach was found around a crumpled radiator, but said their activity around Spektr's solar arrays has paid dividends for the station's power capacity.
Foale described the two recent failures of the Mir's motion control system computer, and explained how Solovyev and flight engineer Pavel Vinogradov fashioned a replacement central processing unit for the computer, which is now operating normally. A new CPU is to be delivered on the upcoming shuttle mission, and a second new CPU, for use as a back-up, will be on the next Progress resupply ship, which is due to arrive next month.
Foale also discussed the science work he's still pursuing during these final days of his scheduled tour onboard the Mir, and he talked about not only the imminent arrival of his ride home, but his thoughts on the next steps in the Shuttle-Mir program.
The seventh space shuttle mission to resupply the Mir Space Station is set for launch September 25, with the launch window opening at 9:34 p.m. CDT. Along with the transfer of some 8000 pounds of food, fuel, clothing, and other supplies between Atlantis and the Mir during more than five days of docked operations, astronaut David Wolf will transfer to the Mir to relieve Mike Foale as the American crewmember onboard.
Wolf had been training as the back-up to astronaut Wendy Lawrence for this mission, but the assignment was changed in July when American and Russian mission managers agreed on the advantage of having American crewmembers onboard Mir who were capable of performing spacewalks to help repair the station; Lawrence is too short to safely fit in the Russian spacesuit. She remains a member of the STS-86 crew, and said she'll spend most of her time helping Wolf get set up for his science work.
Attempts to repair the damaged Spektr module will be done by the Mir-24 crew, which will include astronaut David Wolf, who is slated for a four-month tour of duty. During the month of August he underwent a compressed schedule of spacewalk training in the Hydrolab facility at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, in Star City, Russia, to become certified to conduct a spacewalk wearing the Russian Orlan-M spacesuit.
Science will be a focus for Mike Foale during the coming week, as he works to conclude his experiment activities onboard Mir while finishing the packing for his return home on Atlantis. And as he does, his mission will become the second- longest single spaceflight by any American astronaut--on Wednesday morning at 7:09 central time, early in the 133rd day of this mission, Foale's time on orbit will exceed the mission duration of astronaut Jerry Linenger's trip to Mir and back. The longest American spaceflight remains astronaut Shannon Lucid's 188-day mission to the Mir last year.
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Mir-24 - Week of September 26, 1997
The Mir-24 crew is busy making their space station ready for tomorrow's scheduled arrival of Atlantis on what would be the seventh docking of the space shuttle to the Russian space station.
The astronauts will wake up at 7:34 a.m. CDT Saturday morning. At 10:19 a.m. Parazynski will start setting up the rendezvous tools on Atlantis' flight deck, as all of the astronauts move into their rendezvous timeline.
At 12:32 p.m. tomorrow, Wetherbee and Bloomfield will execute the terminal initiation burn to set the orbiter on course to close the final 8 miles to the Mir over the next orbit. By 2:02 p.m. Atlantis will arrive at a point 600 feet below Mir on the radial vector, or R-bar, an imaginary line from Mir to the Earth. From there, Wetherbee will begin manually flying Atlantis from the controls on the aft flight deck.
At 2:45 p.m. Wetherbee will halt his approach at a distance of 30 feet to align the orbiter docking system with the station's Docking Module, then begin closing that final 10 yards to the Mir. At 2:56 Wetherbee will dock Atlantis to the Mir, initiating the engagement of hooks and latches in the docking mechanisms of both spacecraft. Ten minutes later, with all those latches engaged, a hard mate between the shuttle and the station will be achieved. After pressure and leak checks are conducted on both spacecraft, Wetherbee and Mir commander Anatoly Solovyev will open the hatches on their spacecraft at 4:24 p.m. CDT tomorrow, starting six days of joint docked operations.
David Wolf, who is on his second trip to space, will become the sixth American to live and work onboard the Mir Space Station, taking over for astronaut Mike Foale, the astrophysicist who has completed more than 135 days in space on this, his fourth mission.
Wolf is scheduled to spend four months on Mir with Foale's current crewmates, Mir-24 commander Anatoly Solovyev and flight engineer Pavel Vinogradov. Solovyev, a five-time space flight veteran, and Vinogradov, on his first trip to space, are in the 53rd day of a mission that is scheduled to continue into February, 1998.
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Mir-24 - Week October 10, 1997
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
Goldin Greets Atlantis Crew - Dan Goldin, NASA Administrator, greets the crew of Atlantis upon their return to Earth
Mike Foale's homecoming - Shortly after arriving back on Earth, Mike Foale was reunited with his wife and children and answered some questions
The ongoing mission of Americans to the Russian Space Station Mir is well into its next phase--astronaut David Wolf is near the end of the second week of his four- month tour of duty, and has already started work on an agenda of scientific research in the microgravity environment of low Earth orbit.
Since last October 3, when he said goodbye to the space shuttle crewmates who delivered him to the Mir to take over from astronaut Mike Foale, Wolf has been working with a new protein crystallization experiment, several systems that measure disturbances in the microgravity environment, and the cell-growth experiments in the biotechnology of three-dimensional tissue engineering apparatus.
On October 8, a new Progress resupply ship successfully docked to the station's Kvant-1, carrying a back-up motion control system computer, more food and water, clothing, and other personal items for the crewmembers. The next Progress is scheduled to arrive at the station early next year.
This week it was officially announced that astronaut Andy Thomas will be the prime crewmember for the seventh tour of duty by an American onboard the Russian space station. Thomas has been in Star City since earlier this year, training as David Wolf's backup. Now that Wolf has replaced Lawrence, Thomas is stepping up to take over Wolf's old spot. Astronaut Jim Voss, who had previously trained in Star City as back-up to Mike Foale, has now been assigned as Thomas' backup for the mission targeted for a launch on the shuttle Endeavour in January.
Next week, the Mir-24 crew will continue unloading the new Progress resupply ship, and press ahead with the on-orbit preparations for the planned internal spacewalk to the station's Spektr Module later this month, while David Wolf pursues his agenda of scientific research on orbit.
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Mir-24 - Week of October 17, 1997
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
With 20 days as a crewmember onboard the Russian space station Mir under his belt, astronaut David Wolf is well into the agenda of microgravity and life sciences research of his four-month tour of duty, and this week he's also been busy assisting his cosmonaut colleagues get set for another internal spacewalk to the station's Spektr module, which is planned for this coming Monday.
Wolf's mission to the Russian space station is scheduled to last until the arrival of the shuttle Endeavour in January. This week cosmonaut Salizhan Sharipov, a 33-year-old veteran of the Russian Air Force, was named as an additional crewmember for STS-89. He is training at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. His role on orbit will be to assist the shuttle and Mir crews during the supplies transfer operation of the eighth Shuttle-Mir docking mission. This will be Sharipov's first spaceflight.
The primary transfer item of that flight will be astronaut Andy Thomas, who is training in Star City, Russia, to take over for Wolf onboard the Mir in January. Thomas has been in Russia since early this year, when he started training as the back-up to Wolf for the last increment of the Shuttle-Mir program.
This week Thomas spent most of his time focused on Mir systems and spacewalk training, and he was also fitted for his Sokol suit, the spacesuit worn while in the Soyuz capsule. Astronaut Jim Voss, who previously trained in the Shuttle-Mir program, has now been assigned as back-up to Thomas.
Activities onboard the space station Mir during the coming week will focus on the second spacewalk into the station's Spektr module.
This weekend, Mir commander Anatoly Solovyev, flight engineer Pavel Vinogradov, and astronaut David Wolf will complete their preparations for the spacewalk, including the transfer of several experiment facilities out of the Priroda module before it is powered down and its hatch closed for the spacewalk.
On Monday, Solovyev and Vinogradov will climb into their spacesuits, and with Wolf monitoring activities from inside the Soyuz capsule, depressurize the Mir's transfer node and open the hatch to Spektr at 3:55 a.m. CDT. Their goal is to install three power cables designed to regain remote maneuvering control of the module's solar arrays. This excursion into Spektr is scheduled to conclude at 9:25 a.m. CDT.
Since Monday will be a nearly 24-hour workday, Tuesday is set aside as a day of rest for the Mir crewmembers. For the remainder of the week, they will return the experiment hardware to Priroda and evaluate the Spektr spacewalk, and Wolf has a full schedule of experiment activities in the areas of advanced technology, human life sciences, and microgravity science.
Current planning by Russian mission managers calls for three spacewalks outside the Mir Space Station during November, to retrieve experiment packages from the exterior of the station, and to install hardware to be utilized during future repair efforts. Spacewalks dedicated to repair of the Spektr module are being planned for January.
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Mir-24 - Week of October 24, 1997
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
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Mir-24 - Week of October 31, 1997
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
Postflight Press Conference - Michael Foale talks to the press about his time on Mir
After four months on orbit, astronaut Mike Foale says he believes the most important benefit America and Russia derive from the ongoing program of Shuttle-Mir docking missions is recognition as peaceful world leaders.
"I think the benefit is in two countries working together. And most extraordinarily, it's America leading the world and bringing the world together in these economic industrial endeavors in space," Foale said in a press confererence less than a month after the completion of his 145-day stay in space. "That is really, absolutely extraordinary, and I think we'll go down in history.
"The rewards for America, for its leadership in this, are not entirely monetary," Foale continued. "I also believe at a totally different level, business watches what's going on here between our countries and they are not related to space in any way, but they feel confident now to invest in Russia, to work in Russia, because they see this harmony, this work together at the higher level in the space programs."
Appearing fit and reporting that he can already jog for several miles, Foale said that 99% of the time he was on the Russian outpost he was having a good time. He said he enjoyed the challenge of trying to fix things, and that he and his Russian crewmates -- Vasily Tsibliev and Aleksandr Lazutkin, and later Anatoly Solovyev and Pavel Vinogradov -- have left his successor, Dave Wolf, in good shape to carry on his scientific program and pave the way for Andy Thomas, the final American scheduled to live and work on Mir.
Foale said he and the Russians became very good friends during their tenure together, and that they displayed an amazing resiliency and ability to respond under pressure.
For me they're about as close to being family without being family now as anyone on this planet, and I love those guys," he said. "When they think they're at the edge, you suddenly find there's just a little bit further you can go." Foale said that in spite of significant problems that occurred during his stay, from cooling and guidance system difficulties to the collision of the Progress supply vehicle, the crew never panicked and was able to maintain a sense of humor.
"I was in fear for my life for about one second, and that was the impact of the Progress on the station. And that was probably the case of the whole crew," he said. "But as soon as we realized a second had passed and we were still conscious, it turned into a situation of find out what happened and try and do the next best thing. Beyond that moment, I never feared for my life."
Foale said he believes financial pressures affected the crew on Mir and that it may have been partly to blame for the Progress collision as the test being performed at the time was aimed at removing the expensive automated docking system from the Progress vehicles. However, he added, that is a condition shared by all space managers.
"We don't have a cash cow just feeding the program and giving us money to do things in space," he said. "I think a great lesson was learned out of this accident with the collision, and I don't believe it will be repeated and as such we will end up with a stronger and better program working with the Russians in the future."
Foale said he still hopes to fly again on the space shuttle and that he and his wife, Rhonda, would someday like to go to Mars together, "but only when our kids are old enough, mature enough to accept it. So that, I hope, would mean that I would not be the first one to Mars."
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Mir-24 - Week of November 7, 1997
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
Interview with David Wolf - David Wolf talks about life on Mir
Commander Anatoly Solovyev and Flight Engineer Pavel Vinogradov completed two successful spacewalks this week, during which they removed an aging solar array on the Kvant-1 module and replaced it with a new solar array that was housed in a compartment on the Mir's Docking Module, installed a device on the outside of the module that will enable the crew to hook up an additional Vozdukh carbon dioxide removal system for the station, and retrieved a panel from an old and disconnected solar array on the side of the Core Module.
At the beginning of Monday's spacewalk, Vinogradov commemorated the fortieth anniversary of the launching of the first Sputnik satellite by manually deploying a replica of the Sputnik as part of a joint project between Russian and French high school students.
A minor problem repressurizing the exterior airlock of the Kvant-2 module following Monday's spacewalk was solved by tightening clamps and latches around the circumference of the hatch to hold pressure. Russian flight controllers expect to give the cosmonauts the green light to slowly repressurize the exterior airlock to its full pressure over the next few days.
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Mir-24 - Week of November 14, 1997
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
Interview with David Wolf - David Wolf talks about life on Mir
Interview with Angie Jackman - Angie Jackman, NASA-6 Program Scientist, talks about the progress of David Wolf's science experiments
Astronaut David Wolf's four-month mission to the Russian space station Mir is nearing its halfway point, as he completes his forty-eighth day as a member of the Mir-24 crew and pursues an agenda of scientific research in microgravity.
Today is the one hundredth day onboard the station for Mir-24 commander Anatoly Solovyev and flight engineer Pavel Vinogradov. During three spacewalks over the past three and a half weeks, they have returned the Mir's power-generating capacity to near its level prior to the June collision with a Progress resupply ship. That work included a second excursion into the damaged Spektr module to recover pointing control of two of Spektr's solar arrays, and the installation of a new solar array on the station's Kvant-1 module to replace one that was losing efficiency due to age. Additional spacewalks to attempt to repair the breach in Spektr are not planned until early next year.
Russian mission managers say the slow decrease in air pressure from the Kvant-2 airlock, which was detected at the conclusion of a spacewalk early last week, will have no impact on plans for the spacewalk scheduled for early December. Russian mission managers say all of the station's other systems continue to operate in normal fashion.
Preparations for the final increment of the Shuttle-Mir program continued this week at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center, in Star City, Russia. Astronaut Andy Thomas, who will succeed Wolf onboard the Mir next year, had another session of spacewalk training in the Hydrolab Facility this week, as well as hands-on sessions with several of the science experiments slated for his tour of duty, and a classroom session to familiarize himself with the science program of French cosmonaut Leopold Eyharts, who will accompany the Mir-25 crew to the station early in Thomas' mission.
Jim Voss, who is training as back-up to Thomas for the last increment of the Shuttle-Mir program, joined him for the Hydrolab and science training sessions this week.
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Mir-24 - Week of November 21, 1997
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
As of Friday afternoon, Moscow time, systems aboard the Mir Space Station were functioning in good fashion after a brief power loss in the Core Module a week ago during a test of one of the Mir's solar arrays on the Mir Space Station. The test involved disconnecting, measuring, and connecting multiple solar cells on the Cooperative Solar array, which is similar to the arrays that will be used on the International Space Station. Friday's test was performed to calculate the degradation of the solar array over the last year.
U.S. Astronaut David Wolf has been helping his crewmates with systems activities aboard Mir, as well as continuing his science program. Wolf is beginning the ninth week of his four-month mission, which will end in January when he is replaced by U.S. astronaut Andy Thomas, who will be launched aboard Endeavour on the STS-89 mission. Wolf will return to Earth in late January as part of the STS-89 crew. Solovyev and Vinogradov have been aboard Mir since August 7. They are scheduled to return to Earth in February.
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Mir-24 - Week of November 28, 1997
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
David Wolf is beginning the tenth week of his four-month mission, which will end in January when he is replaced by U.S. astronaut Andy Thomas, who will be launched aboard Endeavour on the STS-89 mission. Wolf will return to Earth in late January as part of the STS-89 crew. Solovyev and Vinogradov have been aboard Mir since August 7. They are scheduled to return to Earth in February.
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Mir-24 - Week of December 5, 1997
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
David Wolf is beginning the eleventh week of his four-month mission, which will end in January when he is replaced by U.S. astronaut Andy Thomas, who will be launched aboard Endeavour on the STS-89 mission. Wolf will return to Earth in late January as part of the STS-89 crew. Solovyev and Vinogradov have been aboard Mir since August 7. They are scheduled to return to Earth in February.
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Mir-24 - Week of December 12, 1997
Press Conference - The Mir-24 crew answer questions from the press
Interview with Frank Culbertson - Frank Culbertson discusses Dave Wolf's increment on the Mir
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
Astronaut David Wolf's mission to the Russian space station Mir is nearing the end of its eleventh week. Wolf has been busy with a variety of scientific experiments throughout his time on Mir, including the bioreactor experiment, which has been returning results that have never been achieved on Earth.
The Mir-24 crewmembers are looking ahead to a busy schedule during next few weeks. A new Progress resupply ship is due to launch between December 20th and 23rd and three spacewalks are planned from late December to mid-January. Also both the next shuttle docking mission and the arrival of the Mir-25 crew, including a French cosmonaut-researcher, are targeted for the end of January.
Astronaut Andy Thomas, the man slated to take over for Wolf onboard the Mir, has completed his training at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia. A week ago he passed his last tests on Mir systems as well as his medical exams, and received final clearance from Russian space agency authorities for his mission. In an interview Thomas said the time he spent in Russia left him with a great appreciation of the Russians' tenacity and resourcefulness.
"Having spent a year in Russia and seeing the Russian community and the Russian philosophy toward engineering, the way they design their systems and the way they build them, the way they build their spacecraft, you have to admire their capability and their tenacity and their ability to keep a system functioning in spite of a series of technical problems. They're really remarkably resourceful people and they've been able to achieve some great successes in regaining the capabilities on Mir, and they're very proud of that, quite justifiably so, too. It was no small undertaking. And as a consequence of all of those efforts, Mir is now flying very stably and I do not anticipate the serious kinds of problems that we've seen in the past."
Thomas will be delivered to the Mir during STS-89 on the space shuttle Endeavour, the first time an orbiter other than Atlantis will have docked to the Russian space station.
Next Wednesday, the Progress resupply ship now attached to the Mir's Kvant-1 module will be undocked, and during the procedure a German satellite called "Inspekter" will be deployed from inside Progress. The automated satellite containing on-board cameras will fly an elliptical orbit around the Mir for two days, conducting a visual survey of the station's exterior before being commanded a safe distance from the Mir prior to ultimately burning up in the Earth's atmosphere.
The imagery from Inspekter, which is similar in nature to the AERcam/Sprint robotic camera that was flight-tested onboard the shuttle Columbia last week, will be sent to a laptop computer onboard the Mir for later relay to Russian flight controllers.
Between December 20th and December 23rd, a new Progress ship loaded with supplies will be launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakstan, and will dock to the Mir two days after its launch. Included among the cargo is a new seal for the station's airlock on the Kvant-2 module. On December 30th, cosmonauts Anatoly Solovyev and Pavel Vinogradov are to make a spacewalk to install the new seal in the airlock hatch, which has been unable to hold full pressurization since a spacewalk in early November.
Solovyev and Vinogradov are slated for another excursion outside the station on January 5th, this time to install handrails to the exterior of the Spektr module to facilitate possible future efforts to repair the breach to Spektr's hull.
A third spacewalk is currently scheduled for January 12th to retrieve the Optical Properties Monitor that was deployed on the station's Docking Module by Mir-23 commander Vasily Tsibliev and American astronaut Jerry Linenger. Wolf has been given permission for on-orbit training for this spacewalk with Solovyev. The final decision on his participation will be made during a joint American-Russian review in early January.
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Mir-24 - Week of December 19, 1997
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
Astronaut David Wolf is completing the twelfth week of his tour of duty onboard the Russian Space Station Mir, pressing ahead with his agenda of scientific research as he and his cosmonaut colleagues prepare for the arrival of a new resupply ship at the orbiting Russian outpost.
A Progress ship filled with items for disposal was undocked from the Mir Wednesday, December 17, and commanded a short distance from the station to assist in an experiment prior to being deorbited. A small German-built camera, called Inspektor, was deployed from the Progress for its first flight test. It captured images of the Mir and the Progress flying in formation before Russian flight controllers terminated the test when Inspektor's star tracker, which is responsible for calculating navigational information, overheated and could not execute any maneuvers. Inspektor was allowed to drift away from the Mir and will ultimately burn up in the Earth's atmosphere some weeks from now.
Wolf's tour of duty on the Mir, the sixth of seven by American astronauts, is designed to learn more about how the human body responds to long-term exposure to the absence of gravity, something that will face future astronauts on missions to the Moon or Mars. Wolf says his experience on the Mir so far leads him to believe it's quite possible for people to make those even-longer spaceflights of the future.
"Certainly we could survive a year. The problem, of course, is missing the great people and friends and family on Planet Earth. Really we live on Earth and it's a great spaceship, but that would be a long time."
When asked about the possibility of being a part of a mission to Mars, Wolf replied that he has put a lot of thought into that and he is "warming up to the idea."
At the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, preparations continue on track for next month's planned launch of the Space Shuttle Endeavour on the eighth shuttle- Mir docking mission, which will deliver astronaut Andy Thomas for the final increment of the Shuttle-Mir program and bring David Wolf home from his four months on the Russian space station. Endeavour was rolled out to launch pad 39-A December 19 to continue processing for launch, now targeted for January 22.
December 20 a Progress resupply ship loaded with food, fuel, clothing, and holiday supplies is to be launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on a two-day trip to the Mir Space Station. Assuming an on-time launch, that progress vessel is to link up with the Mir's Kvant-1 docking port December 22.
On December 30, Mir-24 commander Anatoly Solovyev and flight engineer Pavel Vinogradov are slated to conduct a spacewalk to install a new seal in the station's Kvant-2 airlock hatch, which has experienced problems holding full pressurization since a spacewalk in early November. The following week, on January 5, the Russian cosmonauts are to make another journey outside the station, this time to install handrails to the exterior of the Spektr module for use during possible future spacewalks to try to repair the breach in Spektr's hull.
A third spacewalk is targeted for January 12, to retrieve an experiment package called the Optical Properties Monitor, which astronaut Jerry Linenger helped install on the station's docking module last April. Wolf has been given permission for on-orbit training for this spacewalk, and a final decision as to whether or not he will join Solovyev for the excursion outside the Mir is expected from NASA officials early next month.
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Mir-24 - Week of January 2, 1998
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
As of Friday afternoon, Moscow time, the Mir-24 crew was in the process of replacing a component associated with the Motion Control System (MCS) computer following that system going off-line earlier today. All other Mir environmental systems are functioning normally.
Russian officials say that todays computer shutdown should have no impact to a planned spacewalk next Friday, during which the two cosmonauts will make repairs to the Kvant-2 hatch seal and retrieve a U.S. science experiment.
U.S. astronaut David Wolf is in the final weeks of his four-month research mission. Wolf will be replaced by U.S. Astronaut Andy Thomas, who will be launched aboard Endeavour on STS-89 in late January. Thomas will be the final American to occupy the Mir. Solovyev and Vinogradov have been aboard Mir since August 7 and are scheduled to return to Earth in February after handing over Mir operations to a replacement crew, Mir-25 Commander Talgat Musabayev and Flight Engineer Nikolai Budarin. They are scheduled to be launched at the end of January with a French cosmonaut, Leopold Eyharts, who will represent the French space agency CNES on a three-week research mission. Eyharts will return to Earth with Solovyev and Vinogradov.
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Mir-24 - Week of January 9, 1998
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
Interview with Jim Van Laak - Jim Van Laak, Deputy Manager of the NASA Shuttle-Mir Program, discusses recent activities on the Mir
Astronaut David Wolf is completing his 15th week as a crewmember onboard the orbiting Russian outpost today, and is now three weeks away from his scheduled return to earth onboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour. While assisting his Mir-24 crewmates, commander Anatoly Solovyev and flight engineer Pavel Vinogradov, in seeing to station operations the past few weeks, he also helped them prepare for the spacewalk they successfully completed January 8.
With yesterday's excursion added to the total, commander Anatoly Solovyev has now completed 15 spacewalks during his five missions to the Mir Space Station; six of those spacewalks have come during this Mir-24 mission, including two internal spacewalks to the damaged Spektr module. Flight engineer Pavel Vinogradov has accompanied him on five of those spacewalks.
The cosmonauts have been onboard the Mir 156 days since their arrival last August, and are scheduled to return to Earth next month after handing over to the Mir-25 crew, commander Talgat Musabayev and flight engineer Nikolai Budarin. They'll arrive accompanied by French researcher Leopold Eyharts, who will return to earth with Solovyev and Vinogradov.
This week NASA managers officially set January 22 as the launch date for mission STS-89. The current flight plan calls for Endeavour to dock to the Mir on January 24, carrying astronaut Andy Thomas to take over for Wolf for the seventh and final tour of duty by an American onboard the Russian station. During five days of docked operations, commander Terry Wilcutt and his crewmates are to transfer some 6000 pounds of food, water, experiment hardware and other supplies to the Mir.
Astronaut David Wolf and his Mir-24 crewmates will continue on-board preparations for next week's planned spacewalk. Assuming they get the go- ahead, next Wednesday at 2:40 p.m. CST, Mir-24 commander Anatoly Solovyev will open the airlock hatch on the Mir's Kvant-2 module and, accompanied by Wolf, move outside the station to survey several of its modules with a portable spectrometer. The data gathered on the effects of exposure to the environment of space will be incorporated into the planning and construction of the modules of the International Space Station.
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Mir-24 - Week of January 16, 1998
The continuing mission of American astronauts to the Russian space station Mir approaches another milestone, as astronaut David Wolf prepares to end his four- month tour of duty, capped off by his first-ever walk in space.
Wolf, completing 16 weeks on the orbiting Russian outpost, is now busy with the final activities of his scientific agenda while packing his belongings in anticipation of next week's arrival of the shuttle Endeavour. The first shuttle flight of 1998 is scheduled to launch from the Kennedy Space Center at 8:48 p.m. CST, January 22, on a mission to deliver Wolf's successor, Andy Thomas.
On Thursday January 29, just after 10:30 a.m. CST, the Mir-25 cosmonauts, commander Talgat Musabayev and flight engineer Nikolai Budarin, and French researcher Leopold Eyharts are to launch from Baikonur to the Mir. Just minutes later, the shuttle crew is to conclude five days of joint operations and undock from the Mir. The Soyuz is scheduled to link up to the Mir's Kvant-1 docking port on Saturday, January 31, shortly after noon CST for a three-week joint mission with the Mir-24 crew.
Solovyev, Vinogradov, and Eyharts will return to Earth on February 19, concluding a six-month mission for the Russian cosmonauts.
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Mir-24 - Week of January 23, 1998
David Wolf, Anatoly Solovyev, and Pavel Vinogradov are preparing for a busy week on Mir next week as the Russian station is visited by two spacecraft. The shuttle Endeavour is scheduled to dock to the Mir Saturday afternoon. The STS-89 crew will deliver Astronaut Andy Thomas to the Mir to replace Wolf, who is completing a successful four-month science mission. Thomas is scheduled to formally become a part of the Mir-24 crew Sunday morning following the transfer of his custom-made Soyuz seatliner and the checkout of his Soyuz spacesuit.
Shortly before Endeavour undocks from the Mir on January 29, Russian flight controllers will monitor the launch of a replacement crew to the station. Mir-25 Commander Talgat Musabayev, Flight Engineer Nikolai Budarin and French researcher Leopold Eyharts of CNES are scheduled to blast off in a Soyuz TM-27 craft less than 30 minutes before Endeavour's undocking from the Mir. The new cosmonaut crew plans to dock to the Mir on January 31, just a few hours before Endeavour's planned landing.
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Mir-24 - Week of January 31, 1998
Mission Status Report - Filed from Korolev, Russia
U.S. Astronaut Andy Thomas is now an official crew member aboard Mir since replacing David Wolf earlier in the week. Thomas and Mir Commander Anatoly Solovyev and Flight Engineer Pavel Vinogradov are awaiting the arrival of a Soyuz TM-27 spacecraft carrying Mir-25 Commander Talgat Musabayev, Flight Engineer Nikolai Budarin and French researcher Leopold Eyharts. The Soyuz is scheduled to dock with the Russian outpost at 12:13 p.m. CST Saturday. Hatch opening is scheduled for 1:43 p.m. CST. Musabayev and Budarin will replace Solovyev and Vinogradov, who will return to Earth on February19 with Eyharts. Thomas will spend the rest of his four-month research mission with Musabayev and Budarin, who will remain on Mir until August.
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