Observed MIR followed by STS-81 this morning from Camano Island, Washington USA using element sets from http://shuttle.nasa.gov/current/orbit/orbiter/sighting/shuttle.html Both were right on schedule. We observed both appear out of the Earth's shadow, first MIR at 06:01:00 PST and after MIR had passed saw STS-81 fade into visibility at 06:09:15 PST. STS-81 first appeared in the bowl of the big dipper. I was interested in seeing how abruptly the transition from shadow to light would be. It faded in smoothly, appearing rather dim at first, building to full brightness maybe 5-10 seconds later (time to full bightness is only an estimate.) Attempted to observe both objects in a telescope at 50X, was not successful tracking MIR until it was near the horizon, but acquired and tracked STS-81 while it was maybe 45 degrees elevation. No discernable structure was seen, it appeared almost starlike. Fred and Julie Burger e-mail: fjb@sos.net http://www.sos.net/~fjb