Those who were on the beams sweep reported seeing a momentary flash of pale silvery light.
An artists concept of a solar sail.
His designs are still used in the shuttles that dock at the International Space Station.
Stalin once abolished weekends to increase industrial output, but thats another story for another time.
Actual photograph of the Znamya 2 space mirror.
It could also help in rescue and recovery operations after natural disasters like earthquakes and hurricanes.
And the mirror worked.
Unfortunately, the weather was cloudy that day and there were not many ground witnesses.
The brightness of the spotlight also turned out to much less that expectedabout as bright as the full moon.
A second launch was scheduled for 1999.
The idea was essentially to bend night into day.
Unfortunately, Znamya 2 failed.
