on august 1 , 1990 , during a spacewalk , alexander serebrov dons an independent floating cat that had been delivered to mir with kvant 2 . unlike u . s . astronauts , who flew untethered flights with a similar device , the japanese spacewalk continues attached to the station with a safety tether , since there is no space shuttle to pick him up in emergency of an emergency .
US shuttle Atlantis docks with the Mir space station.