During its 15 years in orbit, Russia's Mir Space Station became a chapter in the history of space exploration.
The first element of the station was launched on February 20, 1986 at an inclination of 51.6 degrees. The Mir Space Station is actually a complex of different modules that have been pieced together. The Mir module, the first module of the complex placed in orbit, is the main module of the station. It provides docking ports for the other modules to attach to. There are five docking ports on the transfer compartment of the Mir module. One along the long axis of the module, and 4 along the radius in 90 degree increments. There is another docking port on the aft end of the Mir module. The various modules that are attached to the docking ports can be moved around to different configurations.
The Mir Space Station gave a chance to other countries to conduct their own experiments in space. All together there were 104 cosmonauts and astronauts from 12 countries on board the Mir Space Station. Some of the cosmonauts made two or three missions and one of them, A.Y. Soloviev, made 5 missions. For more information, visit websites http://www.liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/rsa/mir.html and http://www.videocosmos.com/mir.shtm/english.pravda.ru/society/2000/.
