Subject: mirnews.350
From: "C.M. van den Berg" <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Cc: <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 7 Mar 1997 17:44:22 +0100

MIRNEWS.350                                             7 MARCH 1997

SITUATION ON BOARD MIR REMAINS PRECARIOUS:

After the loss of one Solid Fuel Oxygen Generator in the night from 23 to
24.02 the crew has been struggling along to keep the mini-atmosphere on
board of the space station suitable for the needs of human beings. On 5.03
one of the Elektrons (possibly the 2d Elektron is out of order and has to
be repaired with spareparts to be delivered by the next supplyship) showed
a malfunction and so the crew had to use a part of the oxygen reserved for
spacewalks to bridge the period until the repair of that Electron. They
managed to get this Elektron operational again in the afternoon. The crew
is very busy to secure the working of the lifesystems and this fact can be
derived from radiotraffic during every possible pass.  Among the additional
measures to maintain a liveable siutation on board a lot of airhoses have
been deployed to enhance the aircirculation through the whole complex.  
 
Communications: As it is not possible to communicate via the geostationary
satellites every possible VHF-pass via trackingstations in  Russia and the
United States is fully utilized.  In this way I can obtain a lot of
information, but in fact this is rather poor in comparison to that what can
be derived during the long sessions via Altair-1.  For TV-sessions the
Russians now use the direct links on lower frequencies via
trackingstations. These sessions are shorter and have a rather poor
quality, mostly black/white and often the accompaning speech goes via the
normal VHF-downlink.

Progress-M33: It has been decided not to try a second attempt to redock
Pr-M33 at MIR. The Pr-M33 will be put on a destruction course on 11 or
12.03.1997 and burn up in the atmosphere over a designated area in the
Pacific East of New-Zealand. 

Progress-M34: The Russians are still waiting for the disposal of a rocket
for this launch.  This certainly will not be earlier than 25.03.1997.  They
hope to launch the Pr-M34 on 6.04.1997.  Among a lot of other supplies this
Progress has to deliver a replacement for the Antares transceiver (uplink
to Luches)  and spareparts and materials for the repairs of the defective
lifesupportsystems. 

Spacewalk (EVA): The Russians still hope that Tsibliyev and Linenger will
be able to do an EVA.  For the time being 17.04.1997 is on schedule.

Chris v.d. Berg, NL-9165/A-UK3202