Astronaut Cameron and Cosmonaut Gidzenko say goodbye
STS074-322-036 (18 Nov 1995) --- Astronaut Kenneth D. Cameron, STS-74 mission commander, shakes hands with cosmonaut Yuriy P. Gidzenko, Mir-20 commander, just prior to the undocking of the Space Shuttle Atlantis with Russia?s Mir Space Station in Earth-orbit. The STS-74 flight began with a November 12, 1995, launch from Kennedy Space Center (KSC) and ended with landing there on November 20, 1995. The STS-74 crew members were astronauts Cameron; James D. Halsell, Jr., pilot; William S. McArthur, Jr., Jerry L. Ross and Canadian astronaut Chris A. Hadfield, all mission specialists. On November 15, 1995, Atlantis docked with Mir, on which the NASA astronauts joined the Mir-20 crew. The Mir-20 crew is composed of cosmonauts Gidzenko; and Sergei V. Avdeyev, engineer; along with the European Space Agency?s (ESA) Thomas Reiter, cosmonaut researcher. Joint activities on the Mir and the Atlantis ended on November 18, 1995, when the two spacecraft separated.