WIKIARCHIVES.SPACE

This photo of the crew cabin of the Space Shuttle Atlantis was taken from Russia's Mir Space Station as the two spacecraft jointly orbited Earth in late March 1996. Earth's horizon and clouds over the Indian Ocean form part of the backdrop for the scene. The large rectangular object in the immediate foreground is one of the solar array panels for Mir. The two spacecraft were in the midst their third link-up in Earth-orbit. With the subsequent delivery of astronaut Shannon W. Lucid to the Mir, the Mir-21 crew grew from two to three, as the mission specialist temporarily became a cosmonaut guest researcher. She is to spend approximately 140 days on Mir before returning to Earth.