[inset]A year ago, Mir had been empty for months, flying alone in the dark -- the lights were out, the main computer shut down -- and the vessel was slowly hemorrhaging air. Moscow had already signaled that, short of a last-minute rescue, the battered station would fall by August .

In early spring, true to the romantic form of a Pushkin story, that last-minute rescue arrived in the form of MirCorp and its white-knight backers. The company promised to spend up to $200 million to not only save the station, but transform it into a glamorous orbital hotel, charging the elite $20 million apiece to visit humanity's first zero-gravity tourist getaway.

Like one of Pushkin's fairy tales, it was romantic, but it didn't last long. Plans to send aRussian film crew to Mir evaporated when the launch funds failed to arrive -- instead of a matinee idol, the station's operators RKK Energia sent up supplies.

This would become the pattern for much of the rest of the year. Every time it seemed that MirCorp had found someone with a potential interest in visiting the station -- industrialist Dennis Tito, filmmaker James Cameron, the Chinese space program, even the winner of a planned NBC game show -- spokesmen for the cash-strapped Russian government remained skeptical about Mir's future until hard funds arrived.

The money never arrived.

By October, the Russians had made up their minds to raise funds of their own -- not the $250 million it would take to keep Mir alive for another year, but $25 million to prepare it for the grave. Not even the pleas of MirCorp's president would change their mind.

Mir is now set fall into the Pacific Ocean in February, shortly after its 15th birthday.

The station leaves 2000 more or less where it began the year -- empty and marked for death (at least the leaks are fixed). In this orbital ballet, the excitement hasn't been in the destination, but in the sights along the way.

-- Robert Scott Martin, Business/Entertainment Editor