Shuttle Crew Bids Mir Good-Bye Farewell Ceremony Emotional For Astronauts, Cosmonauts

With bear hugs and teary eyes, space shuttle Atlantis’ astronauts said goodbye to the crew of Russia’s space station Mir and then flew away Thursday, leaving Shannon Lucid behind for a five-month stay in orbit.

Atlantis’ crew unlatched the shuttle from Mir after five days of docked flight about 250 miles above Earth. The shuttle is scheduled to return to Earth on Saturday.

The farewell ceremony was a sentimental moment for all eight space travelers, but especially for shuttle commander Kevin Chilton, who wiped his eyes and wrapped his arms around cosmonauts Yuri Onufrienko and Yuri Usachev.

“We know we’ll see Shannon again when she comes back,” Chilton said. “But there’s a big ocean between Russia and America, and we’re not so confident, or sure, or certain I should say, that we’ll ever see our two friends Yuri and Yuri again.”

He paused to regain his composure, then added: “In person.”

Usachev said he wished they could remain together longer, “but Shannon is with us now … and we’ll do the good work that needs to be done.”

With that, the astronauts and cosmonauts clasped hands and then retreated to their respective spacecraft and sealed the hatches for the undocking.

Lucid is the second American - and the first U.S. woman - to live aboard Mir. When she returns to Earth in August aboard a shuttle, the 53-year-old biochemist and mother of three grown children will have spent more time in space than any other American.

NASA cut short the shuttle’s mission by one day because of bad weather in the forecast at Cape Canaveral, Fla., and a leak in one of the steering systems used for descent. Atlantis will return to Earth with five astronauts - the first time a U.S. spaceship comes back with fewer people than it left with.

“I guess you’d normally get in trouble for coming back one person short,” Chilton said, “but this time I think we’ll get a pat on the back.”

Mission Control gave Lucid a pep talk before she left Atlantis for the last time and floated into Mir: “Want you to really enjoy and take in everything on this flight that you’re about to do. You’re a very lucky person to get to do it. It won’t always be easy.”

Hoping to make her stay as enjoyable as possible, NASA has promised her a better selection of food and more frequent contact with family and friends than Dr. Norman Thagard, the only other American ever to live on Mir.

During the five days that Atlantis and Mir were docked, the crews exchanged two tons of cargo.