MIRNEWS.142    10 AUGUST 1992

SOYUZ-TM14 SAFELY LANDED ON 10.08.92 AT 0105UTC:

S-TM14 with on board the relieved crew (Viktorenko and Kaleri) and the French
cosmonaut Tognini separated from MIR on 09.08.92 at abt. 2142UTC. After an
autonomous flight of appr. 3 hrs 20 mins the descent module landed in 136 KM
east of Dzhezkazgan in Kazakhstan.
The landing concluded the French-Russian scientific mission Antares. During his
stay on board MIR Tognini repeatedly stated his satisfaction about the
scientific program and he praised the cooperation with his Russian colleagues.
In the beginning Tognini suffered from spinal pains. Viktorenko treated him
with ointments, plasters -in V's opinion to small- and anodynes. This possibly
helped or Tognini got accustomed to it for he did not speak about it after 2
days. During the whole mission he was enthousiastic and very active. A French
scientist on TsUP declared that they had been behind schedule due to many and
long conversations between the crew and the press. The French attitude towards
missions like Antares is very positive and productive. This has been the 3d
mission of that kind and they plan to have another 4, each lasting a fortnight,
for 1993 or 1994 and 1996, 1998 and 2000.

HAMWORK TOGNINI:

The French not only appreciated the scientific side of the flight, but also
radio-amateurism on board MIR. In March 1992, during the German-Russian mission,
Sergey Samburov (RV3DR) and Leonid Labutin (UA3CR) asked me to use my
publications to stimulate pressure on the French to participate in ham-work on
board MIR during the Antares mission. Pressure on the French by radio-amateurs
in Western-Europe, among which Amsat-UK, helped. For the reluctance of the
French in March Tognini certainly cannot be blamed! Almost every pass Tognini,
F5MIR, could be heard on 145.550 mc. He acted enthousiastically and strikingly
skilled. It was even difficult to get Tognini back to his work or to the
microphone when somebody on TsUP needed him. When MIR was within range of France
or Italy Viktorenko did not disturb him for essential matters!

DURATION 12TH MAIN-EXPEDITION MIR:

Solovyov and Avdeyev will return to earth on 20 January 1993.

PRESS-REPORTS ABOUT ANTARES:

As always during space-operations press and media distinguish themselves by
inaccurate reports. About the stay on board of Viktorenko and Kaleri they still
have the 8 months of Krikalyov in mind. Vikt and Kaleri have not been in space
for 8 months, but a good 4.5 months. The Antares mission was a French-Russian
scientific mission. A lot of agencies reported that Antares was a mission to
repair the MIR-station. The new crew, Solovyov and Avdeyev, so the 12th
main-expedition, have to do a lot of crucial repairwork. They have to work in
open space to install a attitude control thruster of 700 KG in the top of the
Soforamast. The thruster will reach MIR by Progress-M15 to be launched on August
14th 1992. They also have to continue repairwork on the gyrodynes. A British
outstanding space-flight magazine named the thruster: Sofora. This is wrong:
Sofora is the mast in which the thruster has to be installed. Symtomatic of the
indifference of a lot of Russian journalist towards their own spaceflight were
the reports about the malfunctioning Kurs-approach system of Soyuz-TM15:
regretfully internationally disseminated reports said that the system failed
during the approach of S-TM15 to MIR. Already a few hours after the launch of
S-TM15 during checks one of the Kurssystems showed a malfunction. For the
approach the crew used the back-up system.

Chris v.d. Berg, NL-9165/A-UK3202.