MIRNEWS.405                                           1 FEBRUARY 1998
MIR-ENDEAVOUR:
During the combined flight the 'Russian segment' continued to maintain direct 
communications with TsUP Moscow.  During previous flights the MIR-crew 
regularly used the American communication facilities. Now  they used their 
geostationaire
  sat. Altair-2 more often. 
In the early beginning of the combined flight there were technical problems 
on board of Endeavour and for a short perio d the MIR-complex controlled the 
attitude of the huge combination.  Due to the high fuel consumption the 
attitude contr ol was given back to the Endeavour.  Now and then the Russians 
discussed the recent problems with the space suit  of An dy Thomas. In their 
opinion  a bad  coordination between American and Russian experts in this 
field caused a lot of unn ecessary fuss. 
Departure Endeavour from MIR:  After a few days toiling  to and fro with 
supllies and equipment Endeavour separated fro m MIR on 29.01.1998 at 
1656UTC.  Before the separation Altair-2 transmitted images from MIR. These 
were old video recor dings of the Endeavour during the approach on 
24.01.1998.  A few seconds before the undocking Altair-2 was switched off .   
Altair-2  transmitted  the images of the departure and the fly around  of the 
Shuttle between 1747 and 1827UTC.  A part of these images had been made 
through a porthole of the Priroda module.  During this transmission Solovyov 
reporte d a malfunction of a ventilator of the CO2 scrubber Vozdukh. 
 
Launch Soyuz-TM27:  At 16.33.52UTC, so 23 minutes before the undocking of 
Endeavour S-TM27 started from Baykonur with o n board the crew for the 25th 
Main Expedition to MIR and the French guest astronaut Leopold Eyharts. 
Commander is Talga t Musabayev, who is making his 2d spaceflight. Now as a 
commander, during his first flight he was on board engineer.  T his time 
engineer is Nikolay Budarin, who also makes his 2d flight.  He started for 
the first time in a S-TM-ship as du ring his first flight he was delivered to 
MIR by the Shuttle Atlantis (June 1995). The callsign  of the new crew is Kri 
stall. 
Progress-M37: This freighter had to free the aft docking port (Kvant-1  +X 
axis) for the S-TM27 and when it was clear t hat all went well with that 
transportship Pr-M37 separated from MIR on 30.01.1998 at 12.50.30UTC. 
Initially there were no plans for a redocking, but as long as the Russians do 
not make a final decision Pr-M37 will fly autonomously.  The a dvantage of 
the occupation of the aft docking port by a ship is a better 
thermo-protection of the docking mechanism of that port and the additional 
possibility for the crew to get rid off stuff which is no longer needed. 
Flight of the Soyuz-TM27: After the launch, which took place 12 seconds 
behind schedule, all went well. During the pass
 in the 3d orbit strong transmissions on all frequencies could be monitored 
over here. Musabayev, Kristall-1, reported that they meanwhile had entered 
the BO (life compartment). The pressure was 706 mm. (As always there was a 
lot of inter ference from the groundservices of a nearby airport using the 
same frequency 121.750 mc in AM-Wide) During the next pas s Musabayev 
reported the good performance of the 2nd orbit correction impulse. 
During the 3rd pass over here he reported that they had resolved a problem 
with the percentage of CO2 in the air  and  the so called 'ugli posadki' the  
 angles of reentry in the atmosphere and the related times if they in case of 
emergen cy would be forced to return to earth.  Meanwhile Eyharts slept in 
his sleeping bag in the BO and the Russians continue d to work in the SA 
(landing apparatus).  During 30.01.98 the flight went on without problems.  
An employee of the grou ndservices   Rotterdam  Airport  recognizes the 
language during a S-TM27 transmission and reacts with a 'dosvidaniya'. 
 This was the first time during all those years in which this phenomenon 
regularly took place.  
Approach and docking Soyuz-TM27 on 31.01.98:  This operation was an excellent 
performance.  All went well from the very
 beginning until contact.   Enjoying the benefit of optimum monitoring 
possibilities I could make this statement.  Comm unications via Altair-2 
started at 1724UTC during MIR's orbit 68271.   The approach was going on  far 
ahead of schedule .  At 1725 the distance was 7060M, the approach speed 10.5 
M/sec. and the deviations around the 3 axes were minimal. At
 1732, distance 4300M with appr.speed 10.2 M/sec. The operation was executed 
in the automatic regime with the system Ku rs.  Musabayev continuously 
reported details of the operation. He also regularly stated: No emergency 
instruction.  So Kurs worked well and there was no need to take over 
manually.  On 1735 Altair-2 switched over to TV-transmissions and t he MIR 
complex could be seen via a camera in the S-TM27.  At 1750 they again went 
over to phone with the clear and calm
 voice of Musabayev. 
At 17.54.29UTC the smooth docking took place and immediately both crews 
reacted with great enthousiasm.  Almost always dockings take place  a few 
minutes after disappearance of both objects  behind my eastern horizon, so 
just after the fi rst pass  and VHF window for my position. This time this 
VHF window showed up after the docking.  After abt. 6 minutes after the 
docking CNN came with a 'live event' of the docking, so in fact not 'live', 
but somewhat later.  This was als o the case with the TV-images of the 
opening of the hatches and the meeting of the 2 crews.  I monitored the 
voices of the enthousiastic crews while the TV-transmissions on a UHF channel 
went via a tracking station in Russia, so not via A ltair-2. 
I could monitor a lot of joy. After the mutual greetings and congratulations 
the deputy head of RKA (the Russian NASA),
 Ostroumov,  addressed himself to the crews with a statement of his chief, 
Koptev. (Congratulations and appreciations f or the successful docking 
operation) Ostroumov also congratulated Musabayev with the birthday of his 
daughter. 
Pegasus: The mission of Leopold Eyharts is Pegase (Pegasus).  This mission 
ends with the departure on 19.02.1998 of Leo pold together with Solovyov and 
Vinogradov in the Soyuz-TM26.  (I sincerely hope that  the S-TM26 will 
perform during t he return operations for during her stay within the 
MIR-complex the systems of S-TM26 regularly had to support the MIR-complex. 
Soyuz-TM27:  After the departure of Soyuz-TM26 the crew of the 25th Main 
Expedition and Andy Thomas will make an autono mous flight to redock the 
S-TM27 to the forward (Transition section, -X axis)  docking port, enabling 
Pr-M37 to redock there. 
Chris van den Berg,  NL-9165/A-UK3202
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