MIR COSMONAUTS FOUND ANCIENT SATELLITE

Kosmodrome, Russia (AT) - Russian officials disclosed that a long
lost Soviet satellite and not a resupply tug was the vehicle which
crashed
into the side of the MIR space station in 1998.

The accident became a lightning rod for media attention on the
venerable facility. However the announcement that the object that
crashed into the side of MIR was in fact Sputnik 2 rocked the
scientific
community.

The satellite was believed to have burned up in the atmosphere
several days after its 1957 launch. Russian scientists now admit that
it had remained in high orbit for almost forty years until it impacted
into
the side of the space station.

Sputnik 2 achieved great fame for being the first vehicle to carry
life into outer space. The one thousand pound spacecraft put "Laika",
a 98 lb. Rottweiler/Terrier mix into earth orbit. Laika was reported
to have
perished when the satellite's thermal cooling unit malfunctioned.

Declassified documents reveal that for the cosmonauts of MIR the
arrival of Sputnik 2 proved to be fortunate. Cosmonauts found the
frozen body of Laika within its ancient container and used to dog's
still fresh hide to complement their own food stuffs. The MIR food
tug
had malfunctioned the week before and had left them with a dwindling
supply of food. "The consumption of Laika probably saved their
lives,"
admitted a top Russian scientist.

Laika was awarded the Order of Lenin posthumously in 1958. It was
announced at a press conference yesterday that she would now receive
the Order of Yeltsin for her timely assistance of the MIR cosmonauts.