A US satellite passed within 500 metres of the troubled orbiting space station, Mir, forcing the cosmonauts on board to get into a capsule ready to return to Earth, Russian space officials said yesterday. The US craft, "no doubt an anti-missile military defence satellite", sped past Mir at a distance of some 470 metres, said a space control centre spokeswoman, Ms Vera Medvedkova.
Space officials had been following the satellite's trajectory from Earth, and warned the three cosmonauts on Mir to board the capsule as a precaution, she added.
"We knew it wasn't going to hit [Mir]," Ms Medvedkova said, adding it was the first time an object of such size had passed so close to the station.
The capsule which the cosmonauts went into is permanently attached to Mir in case they need to make an emergency return to Earth. Cosmonauts aboard the station had been grappling with a new computer failure, the fourth since it was involved in a collision with the unmanned Progress cargo craft on June 25th.
Ground engineers said the station was back under control and had been reoriented towards the sun after the three crew members patched up the main computer.