ASI W9600310r1.2
#91 December 1995
Section 6.9.3.2.091.of the Artemis Data Book
by Ben Huset
The C.I.S. manned space station Mir with Mir-20 (call sign 'Uran') Cosmonauts Yuri Gidzenko, Sergei Avdeyev and Thomas (DF4TR / DP0MIR) Reiter and will be appearing in the mid west morning skies November 19th to December 6th and return to the evening skies December 15th to Jan. 6th.
Amateur radio operators can log into the Mir 'Packet' (R0MIR-1) BBS on 145.550MHz simplex or 435.775MHz uplink / 437.775 downlink MHz. The cosmonauts also use the freq. 145.200MHz up and 145.800MHz down or 435.725MHz up / 437.925MHz down or 145.550Mhz simplex to talk with amateur radio operators on the ground during their off-hours.
For exact times and locations to see the space station over your backyard call MN MIRWATCH Coordinator Ben Huset at (612) 639-9109. Look for MIRWATCH and other great space stuff on my web page at http://www.skypoint.com/~benhuset/ .
"This is an automatic recording from the Crew of the Mir Space Station and the STS-74. The U.S. shuttle Atlantis, the STS-74 has docked on time, around 09:30 onboard time. It was an excellent docking. We almost didn't feel anything on the station, Ken Cameron was piloting the Aircraft excellent and we are now waiting for the hatch opening and to welcome the crew. Bye Bye." --- DP0MIR Thomas Reiter.
Thanks to Dave, N1PPP for this report.
Thomas Reiter has spent some of his time looking for amateur radio parts, connectors, adaptors, manuals and cables aboard Mir. He has soldered some makeshift cables after concluding that the cables were not to be found. STS-74 brought up the rest of the 'missing' parts. He hopes to have the 'new' 440 MHz radios working soon.
Extra days and Extra walk: An agreement has been reached between ESA and the Russian RSC-Energia, that the EUROMIR 95 mission will now last until February 29, 1996. To make use of this extra time up to 70 kg of payload will be uploaded in the next Progress flight, now scheduled for December 15th, 1995 and Thomas Reiter will conduct a second "Space Walk" around mid February 1996.
Problem: Sometime on November 1st, the Mir experienced a leak in an internal cooling loop. This loop is part of the Kvant/Core module core system cooling loop. Approximately 1.8 liters of 37% solution Ethylene glycol leaked internal to the Mir volume. Loss of the use of this loop disabled the regenerative CO2 removal system and one of the oxygen replenishing systems. The Mir then used a backup scrubber similar to the shuttle LiOH system for CO2 removal. The leak was found and repaired a few days later with 'a putty like substance'. STS-74 brought up 30 shuttle LiOH canisters and a rapidly developed adaptor (just like Apollo 13) to convert shuttle canisters to the Mir system. I haven't heard WHY we didn't just bring up more RUSSIAN-made LiOH canisters.
STS-74 was launched at 6:30:43 CST on '95 Nov 12. Atlantis left pad 39A on the second attempt; the Nov 11 attempt was scrubbed at T-5 min due to bad weather at the transAtlantic abort sites. Atlantis docked with Mir at 00:27:39 CST on Nov 15. By 00:36 the latches on the APDS docking system were closed and the Docking Module was firmly attached to Kristall. The hatches to Mir were opened at about 3 am CST.
The STS-74 welcoming ceremony on Mir was high-lighted by NASA HQ representative Wil Trafton (head of the ISS program) congratulating the wrong Russian cosmonaut! As he greeted them, he gave best wishes to "Ken Cameron, as commander of the Atlantis, and cosmonaut Solovyev, as com-ander of the Mir". Solovyev, of course, had returned to Earth two months earlier and the current commander is Gidzenko.
Many gifts were exchanged by the Mir-20 and STS-74 crews. The one I liked the most was the folding electronic guitar from the STS-74 crew to all future Mir and Alpha residents.
Stop! Thief!! A report of a burglary at the home of astronaut Bonnie Dunbar was filed in October. Here is a short list of the items taken: All four of her Space Flight medals with her name engraved on the back. A Seiko watch flown on all four of her flights with her name and the first three flight numbers engraved on the back. A watch presented to her aboard the Mir Space Station by the crew of Mir-18. It is from the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center. Very, very rare. Ron Sega's Space Flight medal. She also mentioned that the thieves took anything and everything that looked like jewelry along with. She fears that most of it may have been melted down by now.
From: Dunbar, Bonnie
RE: Lost Mementos
Thursday, October 26, 1995 3:36PM
Thank you very much for your help. Please feel free to contact
me or Detective Barton at 713-474-4471 if you need information or find
anything. There is a $1000 reward from crime fighters (?) and a $500 reward
from myself for information leading to an arrest and conviction. Again,
thank you.
Bonnie Dunbar
NASA astronaut Scott Parazynski had been forced to quit his training for a MIR mission because he does not fit the 'standard' Soyuz seat. Now an 'Izvestiya' article Oct 18, '95, pp 1-2 by Sergey Leskov, reported Russian space officials 'unofficially' saying, 'the Americans, who are paying for the joint project, have recently started talking to us in a bass voice, in a commandeering tone. We took umbrage, decided to show our character, and punished our partner, who forgot himself, for his disrespectful attitude. If there had been friendship, there would not have been anthropometry'.
I've heard rumors of this type of behavior by previous astronauts in Moscow but didn't mention it here and had hoped that the 'problems' had been worked out. Hey guys, Straighten up and fly right!!!
Congratulations to Jennifer L. Green and Friends and Partners in Space Organization on their Memorandum of Understanding with the Aerospace College of Moscow State Aviation Institute on joint Internet web pages and workshop projects. BH
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