Russian cosmonauts Anatoli Solovyov and Pavel Vinogradev made a second foray into the damaged, unpressurised, Spektr module of the Mir space station on 20 October.

The crew connected cables from two of the three undamaged solar panels to the space station's central control unit. The connection of the third panel will have to be performed later, as the cosmonauts ran out of time during the 6h 38min operation.

New US resident astronaut David Wolf was stationed in the Soyuz return craft, in case of an emergency evacuation.

The crew plans four or five spacewalks by the end of 1997, to conduct full repairs.

During the spacewalks they will attach a new solar panel and plug the leak which was the cause of the module's depressurisation following the collision with a Progress tanker in June.

Source: Flight International