STS-89 Day 4 Highlights
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- On Sunday, January 25, 1998, 6:00 a.m. CST, STS-89 MCC Status Report # 06
reports:
- Astronauts aboard space shuttle Endeavour were awakened at 5:48
a.m. CST Sunday to the song."Friends, We Are Migrant Birds," a Russian
pilots song. The crew faces a busy Flight Day 4, the first full day
of joint Shuttle-Mir docked operations on the STS-89 mission.
- Sunday's primary order of business will be the exchange of
U.S. astronauts, a swap that brings David Wolf back to the shuttle
after a 119-day stay aboard Mir, and leaves astronaut Andy Thomas
aboard the Russian station for his extended stay. Thomas is the last
in the series of American astronauts scheduled to live and work abroad
Mir as part of the Phase One joint program with Russia.
- Also Sunday, crew members will be busily engaged in transferring
supplies and equipment between Mir and Endeavour. By the end of
flight day 3, astronauts had just begun the lengthy process, having
moved six percent of resupply stocks to Mir, and brought into
Endeavour 11 percent of U.S. return items and three percent of Russian
return items.
- Saturday's linkup, the eighth between Space Shuttle and the Mir,
came on time as predicted at 2:14 p.m. CST. The docking was unmarred
by any problems as Endeavour Commander Terry Wilcutt eased the 100-ton
spacecraft into its docking port. The joining of the two occurred
over southeastern Russia, west of Kazakhstan, at an altitude of 214
nautical miles. Through the final phases of the rendezvous, Payload
Commander Bonnie Dunbar exchanged greetings with Mir 24 Commander
Anatoly Solovyev, Pavel Vinogradov and Wolf.
- Wolf and Thomas will exchange the custom-made Soyuz seat liner just
before 9 a.m. CST, marking the official transfer point for the two
astronauts. Wolf will have completed 119 days as a Mir crew member and
Thomas will start his four-month stay.
- The Shuttle-Mir complex is orbiting the Earth every 90 minutes at an
altitude of about 216 nautical miles with all of its combined systems
operating well.
- On Sunday, January 25, 1998, 7:00 p.m. CST, STS-89 MCC Status Report # 07
reports:
- Astronaut Andy Thomas officially became a member of the Mir 24 crew
late today and Dave Wolf became a member of the STS-89 crew after the
exchange of U.S. astronauts on the Endeavour-Mir complex was delayed
when problems were encountered during a fit check of Thomas' Soyuz
capsule pressure suit.
- A fit and leak check of the pressure suit, known as a Sokol suit,
had to be accomplished prior to the official transfer of Thomas to Mir
as the seventh and final American to live and work on the Mir. During
the pressure checks, Thomas encountered difficulty in getting his suit
to fit properly and reported it would not fit over his head. Later,
Thomas successfully completed a leak and pressure check wearing Wolf's
suit, and after lengthy discussions between U.S. and Russian flight
controllers, a joint decision was made to allow Thomas to move over to
the Mir and Wolf to Endeavour. Although Wolf's suit is a little large
for Thomas, especially in the arms, it is considered safe to use in
the event the Soyuz capsule must depart the Mir because of an
emergency. The crew transfer took place at about 5:35 p.m. Central
time.
- Apart from the suit issue, the astronauts and cosmonauts engaged in
transferring supplies and equipment between the two spacecraft and
also continued scientific investigations on board Endeavour.
- The Shuttle-Mir complex is orbiting the Earth every 90 minutes at an
altitude of about 216 nautical miles with all of its combined systems
operating well.
- An eight-hour sleep period for Endeavour's astronauts will conclude
at 4:48 a.m. Central time Monday with a wakeup call from Mission
Control to begin another day of transfer activities with the Mir
cosmonauts.
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