Mir-Cassiopée

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Mission emblem
Mission emblem
Mission dates
Mission: Mir-Cassiopée
Crew: 1
Begin: August 17, 1996, 13:18:03  UTC
Starting place: Baikonur 1/5
Departure in: Soyuz TM-24
Space station: Me
Coupling: August 19, 1996, 14:50:23 UTC
Decoupling: September 2, 1996, 04:20:00 UTC
Return flight in: Soyuz TM-23
Landing: September 2, 1996, 07:41:40 UTC
Flight duration: 15d 18h ​​23min
◄ Before / After ►
Mir-Altair Mir-Pégase

Mir-Cassiopée was the name for a Franco-Russian research mission during which the French spaceman Claudie André-Deshays was on board the Russian Mir space station for two weeks .

preparation

After Aragatz , Antares and Altair , Cassiopée (French for the constellation Cassiopeia ) was the fourth French research mission on board the Mir space station.

Claudie André-Deshays was nominated as the crew in July 1994. She was a reservist for the last French Mir mission. Léopold Eyharts was assigned as her substitute.

From January 10, 1995, the two of them prepared for their mission at the Yuri Gagarin cosmonaut training center near Moscow. The training comprised ten months of theory and eight months of practical training on simulators.

scientific programme

This research mission also carried out a large number of scientific and technical investigations. The experiments were accompanied by the French control center CADMOS in Toulouse .

Life science

  • COGNILAB : This is a modular neuroscience and robotics laboratory for studying the nervous system .
  • FERTILE : In this experiment, the development of embryos was the ribs pig observed in zero gravity. Long-tailed newt females can store sperm in their bodies for several months. One hormone injection is enough to produce fertilized eggs that have been fixed in different stages. FERTILE was continued on the next Mir-Pégase mission .
  • PHYSIOLAB : This laboratory made it possible to study the blood circulation before, during and after the space flight.

Materials science

  • ALICE 2 : As in the last space flight, hydrodynamic and thermal investigations of fluids were carried out in the vicinity of the critical point . The instruments had been significantly revised compared to Mir-Altair.

technology

  • CASTOR : This device was used to predict and measure the vibrations of large structures in weightlessness, for example the Mir space station. It was used to model the efficiency of dampers at certain points.

Mission history

The equipment for the research mission was brought to the Mir space station by the Progress M-32 space freighter . The launch, originally scheduled for July 25, 1996, was canceled shortly before take-off due to a defect in the Soyuz rocket . On July 31st, Progress M-32 was able to take off without any problems and dock at the Mir two days later.

Claudie André-Deshays was originally supposed to take off on board Soyuz TM-24 with Gennady Manakov and Pawel Winogradow . On August 7th, however, Manakow was diagnosed with heart problems so that he was not fit for space flight. As usual with the Russians, the team was completely replaced, so that the reserve men Valeri Korsun and Alexander Kaleri came to the train.

Soyuz TM-24 with Korsun, Kaleri and André-Deshays was launched on August 17, 1996. As usual, it was coupled to the space station two days later. Shortly beforehand, the Freighter Progress M-32 had to clear the coupling socket for the advancing Soyuz spaceship, although the pumping of the fuel from the Progress into the Mir had not yet been completed. For the duration of Mir-Cassiopée, the freighter was parked at some distance from the space station.

On board the Mir, the three newcomers were greeted by Commander Yuri Onufrijenko , flight engineer Yuri Usachev and NASA astronaut Shannon Lucid . Onufrijenko and Ussachev had been on board for six months and should be relieved soon. Lucid had been brought to the Mir by the space shuttle five months ago as part of the Shuttle Mir program .

The two women had their bedrooms apart from those of the four men: Claudie André-Deshays moved into the new Priroda research module, while Shannon Lucid lived in the Spectrum module.

During the following two weeks the six space travelers carried out the prepared research program.

On September 2, Claudie André-Deshays embarked on the Soyuz TM-23 spacecraft together with Onufrijenko and Ussachev . Korsun and Kaleri stayed on board the Mir as new long-term crew. Shannon Lucid would be replaced by NASA astronaut John Blaha two weeks later .

Soyuz TM-23 disengaged from Mir three hours after the hatches were closed and landed three more hours later in Kazakhstan .

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