Mir EO-21 was a long-duration mission aboard the

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

Space station A space station is a spacecraft capable of supporting a human crew in orbit for an extended period of time, and is therefore a type of space habitat. It lacks major propulsion or landing systems. An orbital station or an orbital space station i ...

Mir ''Mir'' (russian: Мир, ; ) was a space station that operated in low Earth orbit from 1986 to 2001, operated by the Soviet Union and later by Russia. ''Mir'' was the first modular space station and was assembled in orbit from 1986 to&n ...

'', which occurred between February and September 1996. The crew consisted of two Russian cosmonauts, Commander

Yuri Onufrienko Col. Yuri Ivanovich Onufrienko (russian: Юрий Иванович Онуфриенко, ua, Юрій Іванович Онуфрієнко; born 6 February 1961) is a retired Russian cosmonaut. He is a veteran of two extended spaceflights, aboa ...

and

Yury Usachov Yury Vladimirovich Usachov (russian: Юрий Владимирович Усачёв; born October 9, 1957) is a former cosmonaut who resides in Star City, Moscow. Usachov is a veteran of four spaceflights, including two long duration missions on b ...

, as well as

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

astronaut

Shannon Lucid Shannon Wells Lucid (born January 14, 1943) is an American biochemist and retired NASA astronaut. At one time, she held the record for the longest duration stay in space by an American and by a woman. She has flown in space five times including ...

. Lucid arrived at the station about a month into the expedition, and left about a week following its conclusion; NASA refers to her mission as NASA-2. She was the second American to have a long-duration stay aboard Mir, the first being

Norman Thagard Norman Earl Thagard, M.D. (born July 3, 1943; Capt, USMC, Ret.), is an American scientist and former U.S. Marine Corps officer and naval aviator and NASA astronaut. He is the first American to ride to space on board a Russian vehicle, and ca ...

, as a crew member of

Mir EO-18 Soyuz TM-21 was a crewed Soyuz spaceflight to ''Mir''. The mission launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome, atop a Soyuz-U2 carrier rocket, at 06:11:34 UTC on March 14, 1995. The flight marked the first time thirteen humans were flying in space simul ...

; he stayed on the station for 111 days. Some sources refer to her mission as Mir NASA-1, claiming that she was the first American to have a long-duration stay aboard Mir.

Crew

Mission highlights

Crew handover and Mir Cassiopee

On 19 August 1996, the

Soyuz TM-24 Soyuz TM-24 was the 27th expedition to Mir. Soyuz TM-24 carried a crew of three. The crew consisted of Cosmonauts Valery Korzun and Aleksandr Kaleri, and the first French woman in space, Claudie André-Deshays. They joined American astronaut Shann ...

spacecraft docked with Mir's front port. It brought to the station two of the next long-duration crew,

Valery Korzun Valery Grigoryevich Korzun (russian: Валерий Григорьевич Корзун, born 5 March 1953) is a Russian cosmonaut. He has been in space twice totalling 381 days. He has also conducted four career spacewalks. Personal He is a R ...

and

Aleksandr Kaleri Aleksandr "Sasha" Yuriyevich Kaleri (russian: Александр Юрьевич Калери; born in Jūrmala, Latvia on 13 May 1956) is a Russian cosmonaut and veteran of extended stays on the Mir Space Station and the International Space Statio ...

. The following expedition,

Mir EO-22 ''Mir'' (russian: Мир, ; ) was a space station that operated in low Earth orbit from 1986 to 2001, operated by the Soviet Union and later by Russia. ''Mir'' was the first modular space station and was assembled in orbit from 1986 to&n ...

, would be commanded by Korzun. Also aboard Soyuz TM-24 was French astronaut

Claudie Haigneré Claudie (André-Deshays) Haigneré (born 13 May 1957) is a French doctor, politician and former astronaut with the Centre National d'Études Spatiales (1985–1999) and the European Space Agency (1999–2002). Background and training Born in ...

(then called Claudie Andre-Deshays), whose mission is known as ''Mir Cassiopee''.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mir EO-21 Mir