Space missions (The Dream is Alive)

STS-1: June 29,1979. Columbia. Astronauts Thomas K. Mattingly and Henry W. Hartsfield man the first launch of Space Shuttle Columbia. The launch is covered in controversy after the very public critic by primary flight crew veteran astronaut John W. Young over the fact that NASA insisted on conducting a yet-unproven and risky Return-To-Launch-Site suborbital flight. For “administrative reasons”, Young and Crippen are bumped to the 2nd flight. Instead of actually performing the RTLS abort maneuver, STS-1 is forced to undertake a daring rescue attempt of the orbiting Skylab space station, which is predicted to reenter the Earth's atmosphere around early July of the same year. With mere days left before the orbiting station plummets to the Earth, astronauts Mattingly and Hartsfield manage to use the TRS Hermes to reboost Skylab.

The shuttle proves itself as a valuable and versatile platform, saving Skylab from sn unplanned reentry. The shuttle Columbia however sustains important structural damage to it's tiles and near it's external tank and landing gear doors as a result of excessive reentry heat exposure, which require it to be put out of service for the remainder of 1979 and 1980. It turns out that the replacement of heat shield tiles lost during transport to the Kennedy Space Center had not been properly conducted.

Also of serious note, the Solid Rocket Boosters experienced catastrophic blow-by of an O-ring joint, which resulted in actual structural failure of the right-hand SRB just after SRB Separation. In the words of commander Mattingly “We've been damned lucky! That's the second time in my space experience that I've had the distinct feeling of having cheated death”. Mattingly was the astronaut pushed aside from the Apollo 13 flight for medical preoccupations over possible infection with the measles, and as a result was not on-board for the near-tragic mission. STS-1's failed SRB came very close to recontact the External Tank and Columbia's right wing, but thankfully the angle of the blow-by combined with the lateral forces of the slip stream pushed it aside to clear by mere feet. Mattingly and Hartsfield did not notice anything unusual, but combined with the body flap overpressure issue which could have resulted in dooming damage to the hydraulics but thankfully did not, would have “aborted, performed the RTLS as we were originally supposed to, and to hell with Skylab!” had they known then about the SRB failure and the damaging overpressure at launch.

After extensive review, it turns out that if the shuttle had performed the RTLS as originally planned, damage to the tiles would have resulted in much less severe structural damage to exposed airframe elements. Also, NASA was instructed, after scathing behind-closed-doors comments by vice-president Walter Mondale, already noted for it's critical comments of NASA during the Apollo 1 public inquiries, to replace the SRBs as soon as possible with liquid-fueled boosters, as originally planned. Astronauts Mattingly and Hartsfield are credited with saving both the dying Skylab outpost and the Space Shuttle Program's future in the same stroke, and will serve as backup flight crews for the next three flights, STS-2,STS-3 and STS-4, before returning to space together on STS-5, the first shuttle flight with more than two crew members.

STS-2: April 10,1981. Same as the OTL STS-1.

STS-3: 12 November 1981. Columbia. Rookies Joseph Engle and Richard Truly conduct the same mission as happened in real life.

STS-4: 22 March 1982. Columbia. More testing of the shuttle continues. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-5: 27 June 1982. Columbia. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-6: 11 November 1982. Columbia. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-7: 4 April 1983. Enterprise. A new shuttle joins the fleet. Converted from it's atmospheric testing configuration, OV-101 becomes a real spaceship. The launch is attended by thousands of Trekkers, and a huge Star Trek convention is held nearby at Orlando. Most of the cast from the original series is in the launch stands. Actor William Shatner is a guest star as CAPCOM for a few minutes on flight day 5, after Enterprise docks with Skylab, following the launch of TDRS-1. Reboost put back Skylab up to a safe altitude, compensating for the atmospheric drag experienced by the station since it's 1979 reboost.

STS-8. 18 June 1983. Challenger. Happens exactly as performed historically, except it is Challenger's maiden flight.

Saturn III, 7 August 1983. Perseus test flight.

STS-9. 30 August 1983. Challenger. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-10/41-A. 28 November 1983. Columbia. Equipped with Spacelab, Columbia docks to Skylab which becomes the most massive orbital assembly up to that time. Transfer of experiments from Spacelab to Skylab for extended microgravity research is conducted. Upgrades are also performed on various internal systems.

STS-41-B. 3 February 1984. Enterprise. Happens exactly as performed historically, except it is conducted with Enterprise instead of Challenger.

STS-41-C. 6 April 1984. Challenger. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-41-D. 7 May 1984. Enterprise. Docking with Skylab. Astronauts conduct an EVA to install a Skylab-to-Shutle-Tranfer System (SKYSHUTS), and a new power platform (Power Expansion Package), enabling Enterprise to use electrical power and sharing consumables from Skylab to extend it's stay to 15 days, as well as upgrades to Skylab's electronics. Using the newly installed SKYSHUTS, Enterprise remains aloft for nearly three weeks, docked with Skylab for two weeks. Transfer of Apollo-derived Command Module, renamed Perseus, latched inside Enterprise's Payload bay. The SRMS proves useful in moving the Perseus capsule to it's docking port on the Multiple Docking Adapter. The Perseus capsule is left behind to evaluate it's capacity to provide extended duration crews on Skylab with an emergency return vehicle while no shuttles are docked.

STS-41-E. 30 August 1984. Discovery. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-41-F. 17 September 1984. Enterprise. First transfer of crew to Skylab from the Shuttle. The 7-person crew of Enterprise leaves behind it 3 astronauts on the orbiting outpost. Shuttle remains docked while also transporting a Spacelab module for 16 days, for a total mission duration of 20 days, due to weather delays. It marks the first time an American spacecraft lands with fewer hands on-board at landing than at launch. It also marks the first time two space shuttles are orbiting the Earth at the same time, the other being Challenger launched the day before landing.

STS-41-G. 5 October 1984. Challenger. Happens exactly as performed historically, except Enterprise was orbiting at the time of launch.

Perseus 1. 24 October 1984. First manned flight of Perseus. 2 days.

STS-51-A. 8 November 1984. Discovery. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-51-B. 4 January 1985. Enterprise. Originally planned for early December, Enterprise was to pick up the 3 astronauts left on-board Skylab in mid-September. However, delays in processing the orbiter resulted in the launch date slipping late in December. Limitations of the GPCs regarding roll-over of dates during flight spanning on different years led to the early January launch. Undocking conducted on January 17, Skylab astronauts having spent a full 4-months in space. Perseus capsule rotation is performed, a fresh one replacing the one docked for 8 months. The capsule is brought back inside the payload bay to evaluate the effect of long space exposure on elements such as the heat shield.

STS-51-C. 24 January 1985. Discovery. Happens exactly as performed historically.

Perseus 2. 15 March 1985. Skylab approach (5 miles). Performed a rendezvous test with the Magsat satellite. 8 days.

STS-51-D. 12 April 1985. Discovery. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-51-E. 29 April 1985. Challenger. Combined Skylab/Spacelab mission. Crew rotation, fresh supplies and experiment rotations performed.

Perseus 3. 22 May 1985. First launch with Mission Module. Spacelab candidate experiments conducted. 13 days.

STS-51-G. 17 June 1985. Discovery. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-51-F. 29 July 1985. Challenger. Combined Skylab/Spacelab mission. Crew rotation, fresh supplies and experiment rotations performed.

Perseus 4. 12 August 1985. First Perseus docking to Skylab without aid of Shuttle. 15 days.

STS-51-H. 27 August 1985. Discovery. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-51-I. 12 September 1985. Enterprise. Crew rotation of Skylab along with major expansion by addition of Skyhab (a new habitation module, developed alongside  SpaceHab) to the Skylab station, enabling accommodations of up to 6 astronauts for 120 days between resupplies.

STS-51-J. 3 October 1985. Atlantis. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-61-A. 30 October 1985. Challenger. Combined Skylab/Spacelab mission, paid by Germany. Fresh supplies and experiment rotations performed. One crew is rotated in a favor of a German astronaut.

EK1. 7 November 1985. Carried BOR-6,a test model of Buran,which orbited the Earth 5 times.

Perseus 5. 14 November 1985. Long-duration mission,including MMU tests by Owen Garriott. 18 days.

STS-61-B. 26 November 1985. Atlantis. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-61-C. 12 December 1985. Enterprise. Skylab crew and Perseus capsule rotation. A second Perseus capsule is docked with Skylab, with two of the crew boarding the Skylab-docked Perseus capsule, undocking, station keeping from the Shuttle-Skylab complex from a short distance for a few hours, and redocking after undocking of Enterprise from Skylab, freeing the required docking ports so that two Perseus capsules are docked at the same time. For the first time in space, double-digit number of persons are orbiting together.

STS-61-D. 12 January 1986. Columbia. Happens exactly as performed historically.

STS-51-L. 28 January 1986. Challenger. After nearly 7 years of development, caused mainly by delays caused by the initial design objective of using hydrogen for the boosters which were then switched to more conventional RP-1/LOX, the Liquid-Flyback Boosters make their debut. The flight is a partial success, with one of the LFBB crashing on landing, while the other made it down safely to the KSC SLF. Analysis indicated human error caused the LFBB to switch it's ILS frequency to one of a nearby airport, misleading the LFBB. With insufficient remaining fuel and altitude to safely execute the landing, a remote-controlled pilot guided the stray LFBB to a controlled crash in the Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge. TDRS-2 deployment.

STS-61-E. 6 March 1986. Columbia. Happens exactly as planned?Second flight of the LFBB. Complete success of the LFBB which both land autonomously at KSC.

STS-61-F. 15 April 1986. Challenger. Skylab crew and Perseus capsules rotation. Challenger has 8 crew members, marking the first flight in shuttle history which will bring a whole new 6-person crew to Skylab up and 6 astronauts back down in a single launch, leaving only Commander Frederick Hauck and Pilot Roy D. Bridges on both the ascent and reentry phases of flights.

Titan 3-E, 17 May 1986. Deploys the Ulysses space probe.

STS-61-G. 20 May 1986. Flown as planned.

EK2. 10 June 1986. Carried the Polyus experimental Earth observation platform to orbit.

STS-61-H. 24 June 1986. Enterprise. Enterprise takes off with Michael Coats and John Blaha as CDR and Pilot respectively, with a total crew of 4, bringing the total complement of the Shutte-Skylab complex to 10 person for the remainder of docked operations.

STS-62-A. 4th July 1986. Discovery. President Reagan witnesses on-site the first ever launch of a DOD mission from Vandenberg Air Force Base, rumored to be taking a payload of the SDI (aka Star Wars Program) up into polar orbit. The launch proceeds successfully, to the relief of the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.

STS-61-M. 22 July 1986. Challenger. Commanding the mission, John Young guides the shuttle to a first docking with Skylab while another shuttle is already present. For this complex mission, which aims at expanding Skylab beyond it's original configuration, Challenger brings a new module, a node, to which further modules will be able to dock for expansion of the orbiting complex. First, Enterprise will undock with Coats, Blaha and most of the departing crew of Skylab. Combined together, eighteen astronauts are in space at the same time at the same place for a first time ever.

Meanwhile, two teams of two crew members who had remained on-board Skylab will undock aboard the Perseus capsules and be captured one after another by Enterprise's SRMS. Enterprise will then berth to one capsule, transfer the occupants on-board, then stow the capsule in it's payload bay and proceed identically with the second capsule. Challenger then used it's docking adapter to dock perpendicularly with the module it carried. Under the watch of Enterprise and four astronauts conducting an EVA and tethered to Skylab, Challenger docked with Skylab using it's RCS to align the expansion module with Skylab's docking port, moving into position with the Skylab Core Node, which enabled the attachment of structural elements, pressurized modules. Challenger remained with Skylab for a week leaving six new crew members on the outpost. After vacating Skylab, Enterprise completes it's mission and returns to Earth with the previous crew of Skylab one week ahead of Challenger.

Perseus 6. 15 August 1986. Second Skylab-Perseus crew rotation mission.

STS-61-J. 18 August 1986. Atlantis. Hubble Space Telescope Deployment as originally planned.

STS-61-N. 4 September 1986. Discovery. DOD mission as originally planned.

STS-61-I. 27 September 1986. Enterprise. Skylab crew and Perseus capsules rotation. Installation of docking adapters to enable multiple docking of shuttles alongside Perseus capsules.

STS-61-K. 1 October 1986. Columbia. Following successful attachment of the docking adapters by Enterprise's crew, Columbia gets a GO at launching towards Skylab for Dual Orbiter Docked Operations (DODO). First flight of a very long duration orbiter flight. Tailored for very long duration, the shuttle is equipped with the necessary consumables to stay in space up to 60 days while docked, or 28 days in free flight, limited only by issues regarding landing gear tire pressures, extended from their original limit of 28 days. Columbia has been under refurbishment for most of 1986. Mission calls for Columbia to remained docked for 45 days, which will actually be extended to 74.

This is the first milestone at retiring the Apollo-derived Perseus capsules to enable visiting shuttle more freedom in transporting cargo, limited by the weight and size of the embarked capsules. The Skylab complex reaches a new record for combined mass, with the Skylab core itself, SkyHab, the Skylab Core Node, two Perseus capsules and two shuttle Orbiters (Columbia and Enterprise) docked at the same time. This flight proves that two shuttles can be docked together at the Skylab safely, which enables permanent staffing during orbiter dedicated return vehicle duty swaps.

It is during that mission that President Reagan and Soviet Secretary-General Mikhail Gorbachev meet together at Reykjavik, Iceland on October 11-12. While the talks stall on matters of human rights, nuclear armament reductions and international policy, the two note similarities in the evolution of their national space programs, with the launch of Mir earlier that year. Further talks are planned for the next year of the issues raised at the Reykjavik Summit.

STS-61-L. 14 November 1986. Atlantis. Mission to relieve Columbia from it's Skylab duty and replace it while Challenger still undergoes modifications for very long duration docking at Skylab. For the first time ever, a photojournalist from Times is brought along. Mission is extended to January 17 due to the events of the following flights and would be the last docking of Skylab for quite some time...

STS-72-A. 10 December 1986. Discovery. Same as the planmed STS-62-B mission.

Perseus 7. 12 December 1986. Conducted inspection of Landsat 4 ahead of planned Shuttle repair,

STS-71-A. 18 December 1986. Challenger. After undergoing some software patching, Challenger takes an “improved” version of PASS along in it's GPCs which go around the limiting “feature” of it's software regarding being active in space at New Year's Eve, a serious limitation for long duration docked operations at Skylab. However, Challenger had to perform the first RTLS of the Space shuttle program, and for the first time using the Backup Flight System. The issue is traced to a programing error in the PASS software, crashing all 4 GPCs running it, which was absent from the unmodified BFS. Following this near-miss, which echoes eerily the troubles encountered by Challenger itself on STS-51-F, Columbia on STS-2, Atlantis on STS-61-G and Discovery on STS-72A, the shuttles are grounded for a full review of their flight hardware and software.

A commission is created by President Reagan and headed by William Rogers, former secretary of state. The commission would find troublesome issues at NASA, under intense pressure to keep the busy flight schedule on time. Some engineers and technicians of the STS program come forward with revelations that some missions were performed with some falsified engineering reports under pressure from some managers. The managers merely state that they misunderstood the technical issues presented to them. Also of note was the scathing comments and observations by noted scientist Richard Feynman, who pushed through a much more abrasive observation of NASA's safety culture, published as an appendix to the full commission report. Mr. Feynman was very vocal of the need to suspend shuttle launches until flaws both in hardware processing and human reasoning were addressed around the Space Shuttle Program.

Also, under pressure from the astronauts themselves, a program was implemented to review egress options of flight crews and provide the option to at least attempt to parachute out while the orbiter is gliding under computer control. As jumping in the North Atlantic in plain clothing would be craziness, new suits are then designed based on those worn by SR-71 and U-2 pilots, providing some additional safeties in scenarios of cabin decompression.

The decision to rely only on the STS to go back and forth to Skylab is reviewed, and NASA is forced to reverse it's planned phase out of the Perseus capsules at the orbiting complex. Skylab-Shuttle Mission 12's crew comes back to Earth in two batches, with the first three crew members returning in early January, leaving enough provisions on Skylab for the three remaining crew members to stretch their stay up to 9 months before being forced to come back to Earth, in the event no shuttle flight occurs before supplies run out. Soviet leader Gorbachev publicly offers a Soyuz flight to the American complex, if required, for supplies. The State Department kindly rejects the offer, but thanks the Soviet Union for the good gesture.

Saturn III, 27 December 1986. Lunar Observer.

Perseus 8. 25 March 1987. Unmanned relief launch of Perseus 6. During approach to Skylab on 26 March,rendezvous technologies intended for further use in the Pegasus program were tested.

STS-30. 18 June 1987. Columbia. The first orbiter of the fleet makes the only docking with Skylab of the year 1987, as a relief flight granted a waiver by vice-president Bush, amid intense political scrutiny and logistical pressure. Filled up with a maximum payload destined to the Skylab complex, including spare parts for the aging Core module in space for more than 14 years, Columbia docks uneventfully and stays for a mere 10 days, with a crew of 4 going up and 5 coming back down, leaving only 2 astronauts going up as a caretaker crew for Skylab. This flight marks the first time U.S. Astronauts have spent more than 6 months on orbit, and the first time it is planned for US astronauts to remain in space for the same duration. Columbia lands without any issues at Edwards AFB, restoring faith in the Space Shuttle Program.

President Reagan greets personally the astronauts and announces that the shuttle fleet will actually be expanded by the additional construction of 3 more orbiters, bringing the fleet total to 8, in a bid to reduce turnaround pressure on the maintenance crews which have been found to be in a constant battle against the clock for most of the previous years.

Saturn III, 6 August 1987. Draper lunar orbiter.

1K1. 24 September 1987. Buran. First test flight of Buran.

Perseus 9. 20 November 1987. Third Skylab-Perseus crew rotation. Flight test of Pegasus systems,which allowed for a one year mission.

STS-31. 18 January 1988. Discovery. Official return to operational status of the Space Shuttle, bringing back a Perseus capsule and 3 crew members along with supplies. This marks the first time the shuttle crew has the capability to bail-out in the event the shuttle is unable to make it back to a runway, under certain circumstances. Mission duration of 14 days.

STS-3V. 12 February 1988. Atlantis. DOD mission. Flight is covered in secrecy. Flight duration is less than a day. Rumors spread that this was a satellite capture flight, but all details are classified, others speculate that it was a nuclear powered radar satellite being deployed.

Saturn III, 16 April 1988. Venus Orbiter and Imaging Radar (Magellan).

STS-32. 20 April 1988. Columbia. Skylab expansion mission with crew rotation, Skylab being limited to 3 crew members due to failing hardware aboard the station. A new set of solar panels are brought to replace the decayed arrays of the 1970s, which are producing a fraction of the nominal power at launch. Problems are also cropping up in the life support systems. Some already speculate Skylab won't make it into the 1990s, given that it has already spent 15 years in space.

STS-34. 28 May 1988. Enterprise. Mission carrying various sensor platforms in free-flight for development of new observation satellite instrumentation. As a first and at the invitation of Secretary-General Gorbachev while on a visit to Moscow, Reagan spoke with the shuttle astronauts via the communication facilities of the Soviet Union's space program. During that visit, both leaders announced that discussions were underway for some time about cooperating on some projects in space, but without any clear definitive objective so far. Rumors of the time go from a Shuttle-Mir,Soyuz-Skylab,or Soyuz-Friendship remake of the ASTP, all the way to a manned mission to Mars.

1K2. 7 July 1988. Buran. Longer test flight of Buran. Test exercises of the onboard robotic arm were conducted.

Saturn III, 10 July 1988. Mars Observer.

STS-35. 8 August 1988. Columbia. Combined Skylab/Spacelab mission. Crew rotation, fresh supplies and experiment rotations performed.

STS-33. 29 September 1988. Discovery. TDRS-3 deployment.

Saturn III, 30 September 1988. Core module of Space Station Friendship.

STS-36. 4 October 1988. Challenger. The return to flight of Challenger delivered the Unity node to Friendship. Of note was the presence of Soviet mission specialist Alexei Leonov.

2K1. 15 November 1988. Baikal. Flight test of the Baikal orbiter. Automated rendezvous with Mir.

STS-4V. 2 December 1988. Atlantis. Manned servicing of the Landsat 4 spacecraft.

Perseus 10. 16 December 1988. Perseus exchange at Skylab.

STS-37. Discovery. 11 January 1989. Deployed the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory as OTL.

STS-39. Columbia. 18 February 1989. Deployed the ROSAT astronomy satellite.

STS-38. Challenger. 10 March 1989. TDRS-4 deployment.

Proton-K. 25 March 1989. Zarya launch to Space Station Friendship. SSF renamed the International Space Station.

STS-40. 27 April 1989. Enterprise. ISS outfitting. Last flight from KSC to utilize SRBs.

STS-5V. 4 May 1989. Atlantis. Spacelab-EOM. First use of Extended Duration Orbiter package (EDO-1).

STS-42. 26 May 1989. Challenger. Starlab.

STS-41. 14 June 1989. Enterprise. Skylab docking. Skyhab returned to Earth to undergo processing for relaunch to ISS.

Perseus 11. 30 June 1989. Crew rotation at Skylab.

STS-43. 16 July 1989. Challenger. Retrieved LDEF-1. EVAs related to SSF construction testing were conducted.

On 20 July 1989,President Joe Biden announced that America would return to the Moon by 2001 and send people to Mars by 2025.

STS-45. 4 August 1989. Discovery. Spacelab IML-1. EDO-2.

STS-6V. 8 August 1989. Columbia. Deployed the COBE satellite. Last manned spaceflight with SRBs.

Titan IV, 15 August 1989. Lunar Ice Orbiter / Lunar Ice Sample Experiment.

Proton-K. 23 August 1989. Launched Zvezda to ISS.

STS-44. 1 September 1989. Enterprise. Flew the IBSS-SPAS experiment pallet for the DoD.

STS-46. 20 September 1989. Atlantis. Delivered the P-6 truss segment to ISS.

Perseus 13. 18 October 1989. Launched the Expedition 1 crew to ISS.

Perseus 12. 3 November 1989. Crew rotation on Skylab.

STS-47. 22 November 1989. Columbia. Spacelab-J. EDO-3.

STS-48. 7 December 1989. Challenger. Delivered the US Lab module ‘Destiny’ to ISS.

STS-49. 14 December 1989. Atlantis. Intelsat-6 rescue.

1K3. 8 January 1990. First manned flight of Buran. Rendezvoused and docked with Mir. 6 days.

STS-7V. 9 January 1990. Discovery. Spacelab-EOM 2.

First test rollout of the ‘Jupiter’ Space Launch System, 18 January 1990.

Soyuz TM-12. 26 January 1990. Delivered Norman Thagard to Mir.

STS-50. 28 January 1990. Columbia. Spacelab SLS-1. EDO-4.

STS-51. 16 February 1990. Discovery. Mir flyaround,Spacehab 1.

STS-52. 3 March 1990. Challenger. LAGEOS 2.

STS-53. 25 March 1990. Atlantis. Spacelab USML-1. Joint Shuttle/Spacelab mission. First shuttle mission to Skylab in 9 months. EDO-5.

Perseus 14. 10 April 1990. Delivered Expedition 2 to ISS.

STS-54. 24 April 1990. Endeavour. Maiden flight of first second-generation Shuttle. Deployed TDRS-5.

STS-55. 18 May 1990. Challenger. Delivered Canadarm 2 to ISS.

Perseus 15. 22 May 1990. Crew rotation on Skylab.

STS-56. 11 June 1990. Discovery. First Shuttle-Mir docking. EDO-6.

STS-57. 4 July 1990. Atlantis. Deployed the UARS satellite.

STS-58. Columbia. 26 July 1990. Spacelab D-2. First 8 days of the mission conducted independently,last 6 at Skylab. EDO-7.

Saturn III, 5 August 1990. Mars Global Surveyor / Phobos hopper.

STS-59. Enterprise. 22 August 1990. Delivered the Quest airlock to ISS.

Jupiter Flight Readiness Firing, 31 August 1990.

Perseus 16. 20 September 1990. Delivered Expedition 3 to ISS.

STS-60. Discovery. 7 October 1990. First Hypervelocity Research Vehicle.

STS-8V. Eagle. 22 October 1990. First flight of OV-106. Peace Flight 1. Conducted retrieval of payload launched on STS-3V. Again,mission lasted less than a day.

STS-61. Atlantis. 15 November 1990. Second Shuttle-Mir docking. Delivered Shuttle/Buran docking module.

STS-62. Challenger. 2 December 1990. First HST servicing mission.

2K2. Baikal. 13 December 1990. Spacelab 1-style mission,although not docked to Mir.

STS-9V. Enterprise. 23 December 1990. SRL-1.

STS-63. Endeavour. 8 January 1991. Orion 1.

STS-64. Columbia. 19 January 1991. Astro-2/CRRES deployment.