FOUR US ASTRONAUTS have been selected by NASA, for further missions aboard Russia's Mir 1 space station, as the agency builds up towards long duration operations, on board the planned international Alpha space station.
Shannon Lucid, Jerry Linenger, John Blaha and Scott Parazynski are the astronauts named for the Mir missions, which will take place during 1996-7, setting new space-endurance records for the USA.
Their flights come under the first phase of the US/Russian human-space flight co-operative programme, which has already involved flights by two Russian cosmonauts on the Space Shuttle and involved a NASA astronaut boarding the Mir space station.
The second phase of the co-operation will be the development of the Alpha international space station and initial joint US/Russian space operations. The third phase is the planned expansion of the Alpha, with the introduction of its international partners, the European Space Agency, Canada and Japan.
Astronaut Norman Thagard is aboard the Mir, which he joined on 16 March, and is due to break the US record for a stay in space when he returns to Earth in June. The previous US record was set aboard the Skylab in 1974 at 84 days, while cosmonaut Valeri Poliakov recently set a new Russian endurance of 437 days.
Thagard will return aboard the Space Shuttle Atlantis/ STS71 when it docks with the Mir on the first Shuttle Mir Mission (SMM-1) in June, although this could now be pushed back to July because of delays in the launch of the Russian Mir module, the Spektr.
Lucid, a veteran of four Shuttle flights, will be the next astronaut to join the Mir, arriving aboard the Atlantis/STS76 when its third docking with the Russian station is completed, in March 1996. Herstay will set a new US record of more than 143 days.
Linenger will be launched for the Mir in August 1996, for a 137-day stay, while Blaha will follow for a 158-day shift, starting in December 1996. Finally, Parazynski will spend 144 days aboard the Russian station from May 1997.
A seventh and final Shuttle docking mission (SMM-7 Atlantis/STS86) is scheduled for September 1997, but is unlikely to involve another NASA astronaut stay aboard the Mir. By this time, the first Russian elements of the Alpha space station are expected to be in orbit, heralding the second phase of the programme.
The first US elements will be launched aboard the Endeavour/STS88 in December 1997. When the Alpha is at man-tended operational stage after the launch of the US laboratory module aboard the Endeavour/STS94, in November 1998, the Mir 1 is expected to be moth balled. It will be used as a technology demonstrator for a new solar-dynamics power system.
Source: Flight International
