MIRNEWS.364                                       27 JUNE 1997
    Progress-M34: The Russians abandoned the plan to finish  the  existence   
 of this freighter today. Pr-M34 is still
 needed for Telemetry analyses,    necessary   for   the   investigations   
on   the    cause    of    the    'mini-cat astrophe. For the time being it 
is extremely difficult to  get    a reliable picture of that what happened 
due  to  the
  huge  amount  of    versions and rumours about the failed docking attempt. 
When Pr-M34 will    enter the earth's atmo sphere and decay has been not 
decided,  it  might    take place on 28 or 29.07.97.
    Inquiries: An extensive commission under the chairmanschip of the  Head   
 of  the  RKA  (Russian  Space  Agency), 
 Yuriy  Koptev,  discussed  the    situation on 26.07.97 and decided to 
delegate the investigations to one    or more w orking groups. These 
specialists will pay extensive  attention    to the Telemetry from Pr-M34 
after the undocking unti l  the  collision.    Already before the session of 
the commission Koptev gave a statement in    which  he  emphasized 
 that  the  operations  with  MIR  will  not   be    interrupted, that the 
crew will not be evacuated and that  Russia 
 will    perform  her  obligations  in  the  framework  of   the   
international    cooperation. (How far political int entions will conflict 
with technical    imperfections and even impossibilities certainly will turn 
out  in  due    cour se.)
    Intentions and options known up to now (27.06.1997 1200UTC): A  lot  of   
 press-releases speak about the necessity
  to make a spacewalk (EVA) for    the inspection and eventual repair of the 
little gap or  crack  in  the    hull of M odule Spektr. Such an EVA will 
certainly be executed, but this    will  take  place  not  before  the  
arrival  of  the
  next   cargoship    Progress-M35. The first EVA will be a so called 
'internal  EVA'  using    the transition section (P.Kh.O.) as an airlock via 
which the cosmonauts    can enter the Spektr.
  Module Spektr: For a long time this module was the 'base and  home'  of    
the American astronauts. In this module Fo ale disposed about a  lot  of    
equimpent and experiments. The  crew  has    to determine what still is 
available and can be saved and what is lost.    For the time being a lot of 
experiments cannot be executed and in  fact    the experi mental program for 
this expedition is almost fully suspended.    One of the 4 solarpanels of 
Spektr has been severely d amaged,  possibly    beyond repair. The other 3 
might be able to deliver power, but due  the    disconnection of cables , 
some of those cables had even  to  be  cut  in    two, they are out of order. 
The damaged one and one of the other 3 
 are    badly needed for powersupply for the whole complex. The event caused  
a    powerreduction of appr. 50% . Before
 I spoke  about  a  little  gap  or    crack and not as generally is done in 
publications about  this  damage,    about
 a gap, or even big hole. If it would be a real gap the crew would    be 
dead. Depressurization would have been a matte r of seconds not  only  or the 
Spektr but also for the whole  complex.  This  depressurization   was in fact 
a process which  passed  off  slowly.  The  crew  felt  the    decrease of 
the pressure in their ears and they had  still enough 
 time   to close one of the hatches to Spektr and -possibly we will hear  
about   this later- do a lot of things before
 closing that hatch.
 Situation on board of MIR :   A summary about the developments after the 
collision  as  derived  from    the enormous amount of radiotraffic will be 
published in NEWS.365.
    C.M. van den Berg, NL-9165/A-UK3202
--- Maximus 2.01
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