The Mir Down Here

Russian bodily

Fluids and whiskers rained down

When Mir fell on me

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The Russian space station Mir was deorbited and destroyed in a controlled burn through the Earth's atmosphere on March 23, 2001.

Mir was the first long-term research station in orbit that was continuously inhabited. It was operated by the Soviet Union and later the Russian Federation from 1986 to 2001. Mir held the record for the longest continuous human presence in space until it was surpassed by the International Space Station in 2010. Mir entered the Earth's atmosphere at an altitude of about 62 miles and began to disintegrate at about 50 miles. Debris impacted the south Pacific east of New Zealand. Among those present to observe Mir's reentry was the island nation of Fiji.