CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — The Mir space station’s fiery demise next week will be cheerless and charged with emotion, but the time has come to retire the venerable outpost.
That was the consensus Friday among four Mir veterans now flying aboard shuttle Discovery and the International Space Station -- a quartet that accumulated more than three years living and working aboard the doomed Russian complex.
"Of course, Mir was my home for many, many months…so I know that it’s going to be kind of a sad moment for me that Mir is not going to fly anymore," Russian cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev told reporters during a space-to-ground interview.
"On the other hand, nothing is forever. Sooner or later, every station, every machine, is going to stop operating, and it’s probably a normal way of life when something old is replaced with something new," he said.
"For me, it’s difficult to lose Mir," added cosmonaut colleague Yuri Gidzenko. "But this is our life, and we recognize that the International Space Station is our future, and we will try our best to make ISS our new home after Mir."
Now members of the international station’s inaugural crew, Krikalev and Gidzenko are scheduled to return to Earth with U.S. astronaut Bill Shepherd next Wednesday, the day before the 15-year-old Mir is expected to make a fiery plunge back through the atmosphere.
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Most of the 130-ton outpost will burn up in the atmosphere, and any surviving debris is expected to fall harmlessly into uninhabited areas of the South Pacific Ocean.
The so-called Expedition One crew will formally hand over command of the new station Sunday to incoming Russian skipper Yuri Usachev and two American flight engineers, Susan Helms and Jim Voss.
Usachev, Helms and Voss were taxied to the station by the crew of shuttle Discovery, which includes mission specialist Andy Thomas, who served for five months on Mir during early 1998.
One of the world’s most experienced space travelers, Krikalev tallied 15 months on Mir, including and orbital stint that took place during the 1991 fall of the former Soviet Union.
Gidzenko spent six months on Mir in 1995 and 1996, and the Russian station was home to Usachev for more than a year.
"We may be sad, but the station is going to be deorbited, and it will leave very warm memories for us," said Usachev, who lived and worked aboard Mir during two separate tours on the outpost. "This is something emotional for all of us."
The impending death of Mir has been a highly charged issue with scores of vocal opponents in Russia. But Russian space program officials say Mir has become too old and costly to maintain. What’s more, they say it’s important to deorbit the aging station while ground engineers still can safely control its dive back into the atmosphere.
"There are many people in Russia who do not want the Mir station to be deorbited. However, those people are not professionals," Usachev said.
"Professionals say if the station is not manned, and if the station is not controlled, then it can bring disaster. And I think we should not make emotional decisions (to save Mir) because they can become very costly."
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