Soyuz TM-12

Soyuz TM-12

Mission duration	144 days, 15 hours, 21 minutes, 50 seconds
Orbits completed	~2,260
Spacecraft properties
Spacecraft type	Soyuz-TM
Manufacturer	NPO Energia
Launch mass	7,160 kilograms (15,790 lb)
Crew
Crew size	3
Members	Anatoly Artsebarsky
Launching	Sergei Krikalyov Helen Sharman
Landing	Toktar Aubakirov Franz Viehböck
Callsign	Озо́н (Ozone)
Start of mission
Launch date	May 18, 1991, 12:50:28 (1991-05-18UTC12:50:28Z) UTC
Rocket	Soyuz-U2
End of mission
Landing date	October 10, 1991, 04:12:18 (1991-10-10UTC04:12:19Z) UTC
Landing site	61 kilometres (38 mi) SW of Arkalyk
Orbital parameters
Reference system	Geocentric
Regime	Low Earth
Perigee	389 kilometres (242 mi)
Apogee	397 kilometres (247 mi)
Inclination	51.6 degrees
Period	92.4 minutes
Docking with Mir
Soyuz programme (Manned missions) ← Soyuz TM-11 Soyuz TM-13 →

Soyuz TM-12 was the 12th expedition to Mir, and included the first Briton in space, Helen Sharman.

Crew

Position	Launching crew	Landing crew
Commander	Anatoly Artsebarsky Only spaceflight
Flight Engineer	Sergei Krikalyov Second spaceflight	Toktar Aubakirov Only spaceflight
Research Cosmonaut	Helen Sharman Only spaceflight Project Juno	Franz Viehböck Only spaceflight

Mission Details

The Mir crew welcomed aboard Anatoli Artsebarski, Sergei Krikalev (on his second visit to the station), and British cosmonaut-researcher Helen Sharman, who was aboard as part of Project Juno, a cooperative venture partly sponsored by British private enterprise. Sharman’s experimental program, which was designed by the Soviets, leaned heavily toward life sciences, her speciality being chemistry. A bag of 250,000 pansy seeds was placed in the Kvant-2 EVA airlock, a compartment not as protected from cosmic radiation as other Mir compartments. Sharman also contacted nine British schools by radio and conducted high-temperature superconductor experiments with the Elektropograph-7K device. Sharman commented that she had difficulty finding equipment on Mir as there was a great deal more equipment than in the trainer in the cosmonaut city of Zvezdny Gorodok. Krikalev commented that, while Mir had more modules than it had had the first time he lived on board, it did not seem less crowded, as it contained more equipment. Krikalev also noted that some of the materials making up the station’s exterior had faded and lost color, but that this had had no impact on the station’s operation.

The spacecraft spent 144 days docked to Mir. While it was in orbit, the failed coup d’etat against Mikhail Gorbachev rocked the Soviet Union, setting in motion events which led to the end of the Soviet Union on January 1, 1992.