STS-84 Highlights - English - Clervoy

Pre-launch video index in the runup to Atlantis mission STS-84, launched in May 1997. It explains how ESA's Jean-Francois Clervoy will travel to the Russian space station Mir, another key step towards Europe's role as a partner in the International Space Station. The space shuttle Atlantis will dock with Mir in order to exchange crew members, deliver supplies and test new technologies. Clervoy, an ESA astronaut since 1992, will be making his second trip into space. European companies have developed two new navigational systems to guide the proposed ATV (Automated Transfer Vehicle), an unmanned supply vessel for use with the International Space Station (ISS) - these systems will be tested as NASA's systems guide the Atlantis/ Mir docking. Many onboard experiments are also European - whilst ESA's biorack facility will be used to observe the effects of reduced gravity and radiation on plants and cells, the Morphological Transition and Model Substances experiment (MOMO) will examine how materials solidify in the absence of gravity.

This video index is in 4 self-standing parts. Part 1: STS-84 MISSION:

footage of previous missions STS-71 and STS-66 (launch, Mir, Clervoy and other astronauts in-orbit); interview with Clervoy, Saturn rocket in background; ISS graphics, including Atlantis/ Mir docking; various shots of Mir and Shuttle; GPS (Global Positioning Satellites) animation; the European GPS test receiver, due to be tested during the docking procedure between Atlantis and Mir; animation to show how information collected on each craft's position will be sent back to Earth (and compared with their actual positions); various footage from previous missions (docking, Mir, crew members in microgravity); ESA's Biorack facility; crystal growth; general mission shots of shuttle, Mir, crews.Part 2 JEAN-FRANCOIS CLERVOY: ESA ASTRONAUT - shuttle lift-off footage; interview with Clervoy (also in French), Saturn rocket in background; various shots of Clervoy on flight deck of Atlantis - pointing at map of France, exercising, emerging from sleeping compartment, wearing graduation hat, on shuttle flight deck; interview with Clervoy; Clervoy and family - playing football, in front of American rocket; shuttle/ Mir docking footage; ISS graphic. Part 3: PREPARING FOR THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION - long range shots of Mir in orbit; graphics of the ISS; manual docking sequences from previous shuttle missions, split screen docking target shots; graphic sequence to show start of ATV docking; animation to show the function of GPS satellites; receiver test model; animation to show how information collected on each craft's posiition will be sent back to Earth (and compared with their actual positions); various docking footage; test model of apparatus which sends and receives laser light in visual docking sequence; graphic of laser docking; ISS docking graphic. Part 4: SCIENCE PAYLOAD - shuttle in orbit with Earth in background; various shuttle pictures including biorack; time-lapse photography of seed growth in microgravity; MOMO-related material - crystal formation, convection currents; solar wind graphics, sun shots; radiation monitoring on board shuttle.