MOSCOW -- The fate of the Mir space station remained uncertain Tuesday, with a Russian design board pressing the government for funds to either keep the orbital outpost in space or deorbit it in February 2001.
The General Designers' Board, which met at the headquarters of Mir's operating company RKK Energia, asked the government to make a choice: approve Mir's deorbiting or find money to keep it in orbit.
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"The decision should be made to maintain the station's current orbital altitude," said Yuri Semenov, RKK Energia's general designer. RKK Energia developed Mir and currently operates it. "If the government does not find money to keep the station in orbit, it will be plunged in the ocean in February 2001, right after celebrating its 15th anniversary in space."
Whatever the final decision regarding Mir's fate will be, the station will fly at least until January 2001, when another transport spacecraft is set to fly to Mir.
A Progress cargo ship is set for launch to Mir on October 16 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome. By that time the Russian government is expected to make a decision on whether to raise Mir's orbit so that the station could host at least one more crew or to lower the outpost's orbit to prepare it for deorbiting.
Under the second scenario, two more Progress-type spacecraft must be launched to safely perform this procedure.
Semenov made it clear that the designers oppose the decision to deorbit Mir next year. With funding for its maintenance, the Russian outpost could fly at least three more years, he said.
Even if the Russian government cannot help RKK Energia come up with the $200 million required to operate Mir for a year, it will need the Russian space agency to allocate 600 million rubles (approximately $22 million) just to pay for Mir's deorbiting.
The General Designers' Council also requested funding from the Government to build a Progress M1 spacecraft specially upgraded for Mir's deorbiting.
Mir could live beyond the late winter of 2001 under another scenario -- MirCorp, the international company that provided funding for a human mission earlier this year, could find a sponsor for businessman Dennis Tito's flight to the station. The cost of the flight would be about $20 million.
Tito is set to fly to the station with cosmonauts Salizhan Sharipov and Pavel Vinogradov in February 2001.
However, even if MirCorp is successful, it is unlikely that Tito's mission will prolong the station's life very long. RKK Energia's income from commercial missions only covers a small portion of its annual operations budget.
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