Spaceflight Now: Breaking News

The era of Russia's space station Mir coming to an end
BY ANATOLY ZAK
Posted: October 3, 2000

  Mir
Mir orbiting Earth. Photo: NASA
 
The captains of the Russian space industry sealed the fate of the Mir space station during a crucial meeting on Tuesday.

Officials decided to send the outpost crashing back to Earth soon after it marks its 15th anniversary in orbit in February 2001 unless new funding is found soon.

Mir's original element, known as core module, was launched on February 20, 1986.

Top Russian space officials held a meeting on Mir's fate at Rosaviacosmos' headquarters in Moscow.

RKK Energia's decision to terminate the Mir's mission came after Netherland-based MirCorp failed to deliver the additional funds to bail out the station.

Although MirCorp reached several agreements with the potential clients about tourist flights to Mir, the company failed to provide enough funds to keep Mir safely in orbit.

NASA's Bob Cabana, a former astronaut who now oversees operations for the new international space station, had this to say at a news conference Tuesday: "I'm sure the Russians are going to do the right thing. They're not going to let it deorbit uncontrolled.

"There's a plan to send up a Progress to stabilize it so it doesn't come down too quickly until they can get up in February and fix it. As you know, February is the 15th anniversary of Mir being on orbit and all indications are they are planning to deorbit Mir."

Meanwhile, MirCorp issued a press release late Tuesday saying the organization remained committed to the orbiting outpost. See the release.

Dennis Tito, the American businessman, who booked a flight to Mir earlier this year, reportedly placed the money marked for his flight into an escrow account and offered MirCorp to take loans to finance the mission. The situation left MirCorp short of funds for the immediate Mir operations.

  Tito
Tito during weightlessness training in a Russian Il-76 aircraft. Photo: Courtesy MirCorp/spaceadventures.com
 
Tito still might fly onboard the Russian Soyuz but to the International Space Station, instead of Mir.

Earlier this year, Walt Anderson, one of MirCorp's primary financial backers, paid his own money to finance a repair mission to Mir. Anderson, however, was unlikely to invest into another mission.

"Unless RKK Energia has 7-10 million dollars in its bank account by Tuesday, it has no choice but to go ahead with de-orbiting of Mir," the representative of the Russian space industry, who did not wish to be identified said.

In the meantime, Russian Duma (parliament) proposed to allocate around 1.5 billion rubles (approximately $60 million) for Mir operations this year. The money would come from the surplus in the federal budget generated as a result of the higher oil prices.

These funds, if ever approved and delivered to RKK Energia, would not be enough to keep Mir operational, but it would allow sending two cargo ships to the station to de-orbit it safely into a remote area of the ocean.

During recent hearings on space in the Duma, Yuri Semenov, warned that unless federal funds were allocated to Mir, the station can reenter the atmosphere uncontrollably and crash anywhere, including populated areas.

Russian federal government stopped financing Mir operations last year in order to concentrate its limited resources on the International Space Station.

The same day as the fate of Mir was decided, the Council of Chief Designers, which includes key leaders of the Russian space industry gathered at RKK Energia's headquarters in Korolev to review the readiness of the first resident expedition to the International Space Station. The launch of the Soyuz spacecraft with an American commander and two Russian cosmonauts to the ISS is scheduled for October 30.