The term 'Former Soviet Space Station' refers to the MIR space station, which was a modular space station that operated in low Earth orbit from 1986 to 2001. It was the first consistently inhabited long-term research station in space and was assembled in orbit by the Soviet Union and later Russia. The MIR was the world's first modular space station and held the record for the longest continuous human presence in space at just over 14 months.