🚀 go-pugleaf

     The Soyuz TM-16 flight to the Commonwealth of Independent States Mir 
complex docked today (Jan. 26th) at the station .  The new crew, Manakov and 
Alexander Polishcuk, were launched from the Baikonor Cosmodrome on Jan. 24th. 
Shortly after docking they entered the station to greet the cosmonauts 
Anatoli who have been up for 180 days now, since July 30.  Solovyov and 
Avdeyev will be returning in the Soyuz TM-15 capsule on Feb. 1.  Manakov and 
Polishcuk will be staying up at least until the French/Russian mission set 
for July.
     The docking itself was of considerable interest.  For the first time a 
connection was made with the new docking port on the Kristall module.  Soyuz 
dockings to date have taken place on either the front or rear axial ports.  
The Kristall module, a 20 Tonne experimental section launched in 1990, is 
mounted perpendicular to the main axis on the station at the front or ball 
multiport section.  Its docking section is special, designed as simpler and 
smaller than the current ones.  However it is meant to mate with space craft 
of up to 100 tonnes, such as the Buran shuttle, or the U.S. space shuttles 
(when they carry up a docking adaptor).  According to Energia NPO, the 
builders of the Mir complex, several times this year the station will have 
two Soyuz's and a Progress cargo tanker docked to the station at the same 
time.  (Radio Moscow, Space News Jan. 11)
     Sorry the launch was not reported, but I was out of the country during 
it.

                                                        Glenn Chapman
                                                        School Eng. Science
                                                        Simon Fraser U.
                                                        Burnaby, B.C., Canada
                                                        glennc@cs.sfu.ca