Andy Thomas puts on the Sokol space suit.
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Courtesy of NASA

Shuttle-Mir Mission Update
News story originally written on January 27, 1998

The shuttle Endeavour was launched on January 22, 1998. After three travel days, the shuttle docked with the Russian space station Mir. This is the eighth shuttle mission to dock with the station.

During the docking, astronaut Andy Thomas traded places with David Wolf. The shuttle and Mir crews are currently working on transferring thousands of pounds of hardware, science equipment and water from the Endeavour to Mir. As of this morning (today being the third full day of being docked with Mir), 60% of the transfers had been completed.

Here's a bit of trivia for you - while the two spacecraft are docked, they have a combined weight of more than half a million pounds!

Endeavour and Mir will remain docked until around 11 a.m. CST Thursday.

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