Manual Space Docking Passed Off “Calmly” Says Russian Official

Text of report by Russian external TV service NTV Mir on 16 October

[Presenter] Today, the Soyuz spacecraft carrying the members of the 10th mission to the International Space Station [ISS] successfully docked with the station. However, the developments in orbit made specialists worry a little. Our correspondent Sergey Dedukh was watching the docking at the Russian Mission Control Centre.

[Dedukh] At 0740 in the morning [presumably Moscow time - 0340 gmt], when some 200 metres were remaining between Soyuz and the international station, the sensitive apparatus displayed a recommendation: the approach is too fast and it is better to shift to manual operation mode. Such cases with orbiting stations take place once in a blue moon. A final decision is made on Earth and the captain of the spacecraft takes the helm. Salizhan Sharipov docked Soyuz three minutes ahead of schedule. For the current crew it was the first flight on a Russian spacecraft. Till then, they had been in space only aboard the American Shuttles.

Automatic approach and docking are almost a tradition of Russian astronautics, which is, by the way, predisposed to trust men no less than machinery. But today Salizhan Sharipov has proved that manual docking is not an emergency at all if you prepare for it for years.

Those at Mission Control were experiencing what was going on without any particular agitation, although NASA deputy director Fred Gregory was also present in the centre. As a rule, the 120-tonne Shuttles dock with the ISS manually. Today, the Russian space school has proved its viability.

[Vladimir Solovyev, flight chief of the Russian segment of the International Space Station] The on-board automatic equipment first of all flashed up an instruction that the state of the craft as they approached each other was close to dangerous. Then Mission Control Centre simply took the decision to switch to manual operation. In my view, the crew coped with this splendidly. Salizhan [Sharipov] immediately decelerated and the craft even started to drift away from each other. Then after hovering they had to wait a bit for the sun to rise to provide daylight in orbit. And then they completed the circumnavigation, positioned themselves opposite the docking bay and then, very calmly, we docked.

[Dedukh] After docking, Salizhan Sharipov, Leroy Chiao and Yuriy Shargin took off their spacesuits to dry them and, after carrying out airtightness checks and equalizing the air pressures, at 1135 [presumably Moscow time - 0735 gmt] they opened the transfer hatch. The two crews are to spend nine days together. They will mainly have physical work to do – shifting cargo.