The 136-ton Mir space station will come crashing back to Earth in February, spreading debris across a 6,000-kilometer swath of the Pacific Ocean and bringing a spectacular end to the world?€™s longest-serving manned space station.
Yury Koptev, head of the Russian Aviation and Space Agency, told reporters that the fate of the Mir had been discussed at a Cabinet meeting on Thursday and the government had agreed to bring the station down on Feb. 27-28 into the Pacific Ocean.
Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov will sign a decree in the next two weeks making official the deorbiting of the Mir, Koptev said. When it roars aflame into the Earth?€™s atmosphere in the final days of February, the Mir ?€” which has been unmanned since June ?€” will be just a week over 15 years old.
A Progress cargo ship will take off in January to dock automatically with the Mir, Koptev said. If automatic docking fails, two cosmonauts will be launched to the Mir for trouble-shooting.
Once docked, the Progress will give the station two gentle shoves downward, setting the Mir on a gradually accelerating descent.
But Koptev was careful Thursday to emphasize that the deorbiting process for the $3 billion station ?€” which consists of a base block, five separate modules and an array of enormous solar panels ?€” is not an exact science.
The space agency chief repeatedly referred to "the main fragments" when discussing where Mir might hit the Earth. The space agency is hoping to land those main fragments of Mir in a patch of the Pacific Ocean 6,000 kilometers long and 500 kilometers wide, and about 1,500 kilometers from Australia.
Click here to read our Special Report on Russia's New Space Age.
Koptev said that Mir would ultimately break up into "thousands" of pieces, some weighing as much as 700 kilograms, and some of which will be heavy enough and moving fast enough to blast through 2 meters of reinforced concrete upon impact.
He and other space officials did not rule out the possibility that chunks of Mir might hit land ?€” as has happened with other deorbited space vehicles.
In 1978, for example, a Soviet defense satellite carrying a small load of uranium spun out of control and crashed into Canada?€™s Northwest Territories. The following year, the U.S. station Skylab was supposed to land in the south Atlantic but instead scattered over the Indian Ocean and parts of Australia.
The Korolyov center also in its day failed to bring down the Salyut-3 and Salyut-7 stations where they originally had planned. The Salyut-3 at least still hit only ocean, but debris from the 40-ton Salyut-7 eventually smashed into the Andes Mountains on the border between Chile and Argentina.
The hope this time is that the aging Mir ?€” which for the past few years has been plagued by accident after accident ?€” will enjoy a luckier landing.
"We already have a detailed [deorbiting] plan that we only have to take off the shelf and apply," said Viktor Blagov, deputy head of the Korolyov Flight Control Center and a man who has participated in the deorbiting of more than 100 cargo ships and several Salyut space stations. But, Blagov added, there are no guarantees "that everything will go as planned."
Whatever happens, Blagov added, deorbiting promises to be spectacular.
Blagov said the heat and friction of reentry into the atmosphere will first tear off the Mir?€™s solar panels, then cause the station?€™s fuel tanks to explode, and then rip the Mir?€™s five modules apart from each other.
Most of the Mir will burn away before reaching the planet?€™s surface. But the heat-resistant ball-shaped gas tanks, parts of the Mir?€™s engines and some of its gyrodines will probably survive the heat to smash into the ocean, he said.
Blagov, like many other Russian space veterans, has in past repeatedly called for extending the life of the Mir. Now he says he has given up on the station. "I used to worry about Mir?€™s fate a lot, but I?€™ve given up," he said. "We all die some day."
Even so, Russia remains the only nation in the world with its own space station ?€” one that American and other astronauts have frequently visited ?€” and deorbiting the station is not broadly popular.
An opinion poll released by the ROMIR research center Thursday showed that 61 percent of Russians believe the Mir should remain in orbit. Another 40 percent of the poll?€™s 2,000 respondents said the federal government should put more funding into Mir.
Last year the government cut off Mir?€™s funding. But the authorities have repeatedly balked at signing the station?€™s death warrant, and instead allowed companies that operate the station ?€” the RKK Energia company and MirCorp ?€” to seek private-sector cash to keep the station up.
Ever since, the Amsterdam-based MirCorp has offered innovative schemes to raise cash for Mir. It has flirted with space tourists, and talked with U.S. television network NBC about sending a game show contestant into orbit.
MirCorp had no comment on Thursday about the announcement that the Mir is coming down within three months. MirCorp has already taken part of a multi-million-dollar payment from U.S. would-be space tourist Dennis Tito, a former NASA engineer who has been drilling for a trip to the Mir at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in the Star City.
A Russian space agency official said Thursday that Tito might instead be offered a trip to the 16-nation International Space Station.
Earlier this month the first ISS crew arrived on board: two Russian cosmonauts and one U.S. astronaut. On Thursday morning, a Progress cargo ship took off from Baikonur in Kazakhstan to deliver 2.5 tons of fuel, air, food and others supplies to the ISS.
Yury Koptev, head of the Russian Aviation and Space Agency, told reporters that the fate of the Mir had been discussed at a Cabinet meeting on Thursday and the government had agreed to bring the station down on Feb. 27-28 into the Pacific Ocean.
Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov will sign a decree in the next two weeks making official the deorbiting of the Mir, Koptev said. When it roars aflame into the Earth?€™s atmosphere in the final days of February, the Mir ?€” which has been unmanned since June ?€” will be just a week over 15 years old.
A Progress cargo ship will take off in January to dock automatically with the Mir, Koptev said. If automatic docking fails, two cosmonauts will be launched to the Mir for trouble-shooting.
Once docked, the Progress will give the station two gentle shoves downward, setting the Mir on a gradually accelerating descent.
But Koptev was careful Thursday to emphasize that the deorbiting process for the $3 billion station ?€” which consists of a base block, five separate modules and an array of enormous solar panels ?€” is not an exact science.
The space agency chief repeatedly referred to "the main fragments" when discussing where Mir might hit the Earth. The space agency is hoping to land those main fragments of Mir in a patch of the Pacific Ocean 6,000 kilometers long and 500 kilometers wide, and about 1,500 kilometers from Australia.
Koptev said that Mir would ultimately break up into "thousands" of pieces, some weighing as much as 700 kilograms, and some of which will be heavy enough and moving fast enough to blast through 2 meters of reinforced concrete upon impact.
He and other space officials did not rule out the possibility that chunks of Mir might hit land ?€” as has happened with other deorbited space vehicles.
In 1978, for example, a Soviet defense satellite carrying a small load of uranium spun out of control and crashed into Canada?€™s Northwest Territories. The following year, the U.S. station Skylab was supposed to land in the south Atlantic but instead scattered over the Indian Ocean and parts of Australia.
The Korolyov center also in its day failed to bring down the Salyut-3 and Salyut-7 stations where they originally had planned. The Salyut-3 at least still hit only ocean, but debris from the 40-ton Salyut-7 eventually smashed into the Andes Mountains on the border between Chile and Argentina.
The hope this time is that the aging Mir ?€” which for the past few years has been plagued by accident after accident ?€” will enjoy a luckier landing.
"We already have a detailed [deorbiting] plan that we only have to take off the shelf and apply," said Viktor Blagov, deputy head of the Korolyov Flight Control Center and a man who has participated in the deorbiting of more than 100 cargo ships and several Salyut space stations. But, Blagov added, there are no guarantees "that everything will go as planned."
Whatever happens, Blagov added, deorbiting promises to be spectacular.
Blagov said the heat and friction of reentry into the atmosphere will first tear off the Mir?€™s solar panels, then cause the station?€™s fuel tanks to explode, and then rip the Mir?€™s five modules apart from each other.
Most of the Mir will burn away before reaching the planet?€™s surface. But the heat-resistant ball-shaped gas tanks, parts of the Mir?€™s engines and some of its gyrodines will probably survive the heat to smash into the ocean, he said.
Blagov, like many other Russian space veterans, has in past repeatedly called for extending the life of the Mir. Now he says he has given up on the station. "I used to worry about Mir?€™s fate a lot, but I?€™ve given up," he said. "We all die some day."
Even so, Russia remains the only nation in the world with its own space station ?€” one that American and other astronauts have frequently visited ?€” and deorbiting the station is not broadly popular.
An opinion poll released by the ROMIR research center Thursday showed that 61 percent of Russians believe the Mir should remain in orbit. Another 40 percent of the poll?€™s 2,000 respondents said the federal government should put more funding into Mir.
Last year the government cut off Mir?€™s funding. But the authorities have repeatedly balked at signing the station?€™s death warrant, and instead allowed companies that operate the station ?€” the RKK Energia company and MirCorp ?€” to seek private-sector cash to keep the station up.
Ever since, the Amsterdam-based MirCorp has offered innovative schemes to raise cash for Mir. It has flirted with space tourists, and talked with U.S. television network NBC about sending a game show contestant into orbit.
MirCorp had no comment on Thursday about the announcement that the Mir is coming down within three months. MirCorp has already taken part of a multi-million-dollar payment from U.S. would-be space tourist Dennis Tito, a former NASA engineer who has been drilling for a trip to the Mir at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in the Star City.
A Russian space agency official said Thursday that Tito might instead be offered a trip to the 16-nation International Space Station.
Earlier this month the first ISS crew arrived on board: two Russian cosmonauts and one U.S. astronaut. On Thursday morning, a Progress cargo ship took off from Baikonur in Kazakhstan to deliver 2.5 tons of fuel, air, food and others supplies to the ISS.
A Message from The Moscow Times:
Dear readers,
We are facing unprecedented challenges. Russia's Prosecutor General's Office has designated The Moscow Times as an "undesirable" organization, criminalizing our work and putting our staff at risk of prosecution. This follows our earlier unjust labeling as a "foreign agent."
These actions are direct attempts to silence independent journalism in Russia. The authorities claim our work "discredits the decisions of the Russian leadership." We see things differently: we strive to provide accurate, unbiased reporting on Russia.
We, the journalists of The Moscow Times, refuse to be silenced. But to continue our work, we need your help.
Your support, no matter how small, makes a world of difference. If you can, please support us monthly starting from just $2. It's quick to set up, and every contribution makes a significant impact.
By supporting The Moscow Times, you're defending open, independent journalism in the face of repression. Thank you for standing with us.
Not ready to support today?
Remind me later.
Remind me later.
×
Remind me next month
Thank you! Your reminder is set.
We will send you one reminder email a month from now. For details on the personal data we collect and how it is used, please see our Privacy Policy.