Dragonfly: NASA and the Crisis Aboard Mir (Hardcover)

There are a few silly errors in the text, but they would only annoy you if you knew better. For example the Soyuz isn't launched on a Proton rocket, and the cosmonauts don't wear Orlan suits for launch and entry - they wear the lightweight Sokol (Falcon) outfits.

More seriously, the geometry of the collision is wrong (he is using what was reported in the Media at the time) and even though he refers to the video from the Progress camera, he appears either not to have watched it or not have been able to 'see' what it portrayed.

What is crucial, is to appreciate that much of the drama is recreated. It is important to distinguish between the italicised transcript quotes and the 'reconstructed' conversations, and between fact (as far as can be reconstructed from video) and the picture painted in the book.

I have heard it slagged as anti-NASA. I disagree. I reckon it was probably fair in the sense that he captured the lousy working relationship between the Russians (controllers and cosmonauts), the Americans (those working on Shuttle-Mir and those ignoring it), and the thrown-together cooperation. To that extent, this was undoubtedly a valuable learning curve for ISS for all concerned.

I can't help feel that the fly in the ointment is always the US Congress with its obsession for 'overseeing', but no sense of responsibility for the consequences.

I think the book brought out the fact that the folks working in Russia and America on these space projects are not exactly singing in harmony.

I strongly recommend this book.

"25 June 1997, 12.06. Space Station Mir. Astronauts Lazutkin, Foale and Tsibliyev await the imminent arrival of the Progress supply vessel. It >has vanished from their radar."

Mir doesn't have a radar. It does has transponders for the Kurs 'radio-technical' system on the spacecraft, but, as I understand it, this was deactivated for this TORU docking test.

"12.08. The Progress suddenly appears from behind a vast solar panel, much closer than expected and moving too fast."

The ferry approached Mir from above (with respect to the Earth) and Mir was 'upside down', with its 'floor' facing the ferry. There are no solar panels projecting in the direction from which the ferry was approaching, so it could not have been 'behind' one.

"12.09. The Progress passes by the docking port and crashes into the hull of Mir."

It was not approaching Mir on-axis, to dock with Kvant 1. It flew in from above, and nosed the 'floor' of Kvant 1, rotated and rear-ended Spektr. I cite the evidence of the TV from the ferry's docking camera.

Burrough is supposed to have spoken to all the principals, and gained access to transcripts. Don't tell me he didn't see the video - it was presented on CNN, afterall.

Not too impressive so far!

And I haven't even reached page 1... but maybe it will get better

David Harland