MIRNEWS.399                                        17 DECEMBER 1997
Progress-M36: 
According to plan this freighter undocked from MIR on 17.12.97 at 0602UTC.  
As soon as Pr-M36 was at a safe distance fr om MIR the German-Russian 
observation satellite Inspektor was jettisoned from Pr-M36  (0735UTC). The 
crew of the MIR ob served  both autonomously flying objects on monitors of 
the TORU system and via portholes. 
 Inspektor: 
Immediately after the launch of the Inspektor it was clear that it would be 
impossible to steer the satellite by the re mote control system due to a 
failure of the star sensor of Inspektor.  The flight around the Progress-M36 
was impossibl e and after a few hours of observing  and analysing all further 
operations with Inspektor were  cancelled. 
During MIR's orbit 67565 between 1307 and 1354UTC during a communication 
session via Altair-2  the cosmonauts and TsUP thoroughly discussed the 
problems.  MIR also transmitted images to earth with that what could be seen 
on monitors and v ia the big porthole of the Priroda module.  Inspektor was 
flying not far from Pr-M36.  Inspektor has to be given up and
 will decay and burn up in the earth atmosphere  in the near future due to 
the natural drag. Next week experts of DLR w ill  try to pick up Inspektor's 
telemetry to find out what went wrong. 
MIR:   As of the beginning of his autonomous flight Inspektor was an unguided 
missile and a collision with the MIR-comp lex  was possible.  So the Russians 
decided to bring MIR in a somewhat higher orbit.  This orbit correction took 
place on 17.12 at 1511UTC.  
Progress-M36: The transmissions of this freighter could be monitored during 
all possible passes on 17.12.1997.  When Pr -M36 will be put on a destruction 
course was not yet decided when this report went to the press. (The use of 
Pr-M36 for
 some additional tests of the TORU system might be a possibility.)
Progress-M37:  Life goes on and  so  the launch of the next freighter is 
still on schedule. This launch has been put fo rward and will take place from 
Baykonur on 20.12.97 at 0845UTC. If all goes as fervidly whished Pr-M37 will 
dock at MIR
 on 22.12.97 at 1045UTC.
 Chris van den Berg,   NL-9165/A-UK3202.
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