This picture shows MIR's anticipated arrival zone. MIR did splash down within this predicted zone.
Courtesy of the Russian Space Agency
Space Stations Galore
News story originally written on March 29, 2001
This certainly is a special week in space station history! 15-year-old space station MIR entered
the Earth's atmosphere, breaking apart and burning up. MIR came down on March 23, 2001, ending its 2.1 billion mile voyage. Pieces of the station that did not burn up completely, plummeted into the Pacific
Ocean near Fiji. No injury or damage was done by these falling pieces. It is expected that some remnants of the station might wash up on shore of the Pacific Islands. Otherwise, the MIR space station is no more.
Russia's work on space stations is far from complete though. The 2nd crew of the International Space Station (ISS) is commanded by Russian Yury Usachev. The other 2 crew members onboard are American Flight Engineers Jim Voss and Susan Helms. This crew is just getting settled on the ISS. They spent a busy first week activating and testing the communications systems, robotic
workstations and scientific experiments onboard the station.
The ISS crew is already anticipating a visit from the Endeavour shuttle in late April. This Endeavour mission will deliver the Canadian-built robotic arm for the ISS and the Italian Space Agency-developed module named Raffaello. Raffaello includes more research equipment than any previous
station flight. This certainly is an international effort!
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