The Apollo-Soyuz Test Program is now already speculated whether the U.S. shuttle program is not going to continue to completion of the new (private) space shuttles generation in some yet to be determined form.
The reason is clear: on the one hand, only the shuttle can carry heavy loads into space, or raise the ISS to a higher orbit. This would in a marked increase in solar activity (of which one at the moment but not much notice) are also urgently needed: an increased stream of particles from the sun expands the ionosphere from the earth and its particles could rub on the space station and will, as it did decrease the space station Skylab in 1979 to crash, or at least to a lower orbit can.
After setting the moon flights Apollo 17 in December 1972 and already been planned, but still far from finished space shuttle, had the United States during the Cold War, in principle, no independent access to the orbit. Although there was the Skylab mission 1-4 a few efforts (but on the recovery already for the Apollo missions 18-20 manufactured items), and 1975, the Apollo-Soyuz mission (with the last, still available Related APOLLO spacecraft was used), but could be up to 12 April 1981 not send its own astronauts into space more. Let us therefore once the almost forgotten today ASTP mission at times a little more closely.
The Apollo-Soyuz Test Project that is wrong and then called Apollo 18, we owe above all changed political environment. Without the early 70's incipient détente such a task would have been unthinkable. On the edge of consultations between the U.S. and the former Soviet Union in 1972, a joint space flight has been agreed as a symbol of mutual trust. Early 1973, then became the team for the space flight announced. Until the final flight in 1975 was the longest time you ever needed to prepare for an Apollo flight.
Such was this first American-Soviet Commonwealth of flight for even more of a propaganda enterprise, albeit on both sides alongside a bit of science took place. A little surprisingly, he is now considered the foundation for the joint between America and Russia and some other countries operated ISS, for the first flight in 1975, also no joint ventures have been agreed in space travel. This was only after the collapse of the Soviet Union back in vogue.
order but an American Apollo and a Soviet Soyuz spacecraft in orbit with each other could be connected, one had a solution be sought to compensate for the different technical systems. The answer can be found in the form of a docking module and airlock and docking port. Main problem was the different air mixtures in the two space ships. APOLLO in the air was pure oxygen at a pressure of 34% of the Earth's atmosphere, traditionally in SOYUZ of oxygen and nitrogen in the same mixture as in the Earth's atmosphere. For the joint mission of this but was on 68% of the usual mixture reduced.
The module has been in the "hold" of the last Saturn-IB, housed the Apollo carried into Earth orbit. That was then withdrawn and connected to the command of Apollo (analogous to the procedure at the Extracting of the moon landing vehicle from the S IVb at the moon flights).
SOYUZ was 19, the spaceship on the Soviet side, manned by Alexei Leonov (flew in Voskhod-2) and Valeri Kubasov (Replacement Crew: Anatoli Filipchenko and Nikolai Rukwischnikow, both flew before the Soyuz 16), also first started. On 15 July 1975, it took off at the top of a Soyuz U rocket. The launch was the first ever to be broadcast live from the USSR.
whole 7.5 hours later, launched from the Apollo crew at Cape Canaveral. Commander was Thomas Stafford (GEMINI 6, Gemini 9, Apollo 10), Pilot Vance Brand (previously worked only in support of teams, but never in space) and docking module pilot Deke K. Slayton (was despite a long association with NASA's astronauts have never been All). The backup crew consisted of Alan Bean (Apollo 12, Skylab 3), Ron Evans (APOLLO 17) and Jack Lousma (Skylab 3, STS-3 later). were
After the launch of Apollo, a first for its time, seven astronauts at a time in space than on the Soviet space station Salyut 4-sided just two other cosmonauts their service.
On 17 July 1975 were the two spacecraft at 8:01 OAZ first visual contact with each other on and immediately launched a the rendezvous and the coupling, with the active APOLLO SOYUZ and took the passive role. So both ships were initially for 44 hours together. In this period increased several times astronauts and cosmonauts in each other's spacecraft, with but remained a member of each crew on board. Sure, there was lots of it photo / TV Schedules and transfers, which should stress the joint in space travel. The first encounter in space took place on 17 July 1975 at 14:15 clock instead of OAZ as Stafford and Slayton entered the Soyuz.
After the 47 hours and 17 minutes flight, joint and decoupled APOLLO SOYUZ pushed for half an hour and APOLLO themselves against the sun, that the Soviet astronauts aboard the Soyuz was an artificial solar eclipse. Then the spacecraft coupled together again, this time took the lead SOYUZ. After another three hours apart was one final, SOYUZ landed - again live televised - 21 July 1975 in the Kazakh desert. Apollo, meanwhile, circled the Earth for three more days - knowing that it would be for a long time the last manned NASA mission. In mind, experiments have been successfully made of earth observation and to explore the sun.
On 24 July 1975 returned the last Apollo crew to Earth and landed in the Pacific, where she was rescued by the crew of the USS New Orleans. This last Apollo landing was not smooth, however, and almost ended in disaster.
On 23 July there was still held in the U.S., the first official press conference of all parties, in which the Apollo astronauts had been switched on by radio. On 24 July at 15:44 Eastern Time Clock was the separation between the command module and service module, after orbiting the Earth for 138-times had. Saw it only after routine, so put the automatic in the deployment of the parachute and the astronauts had to manually trigger. This led at 16:18 clock OAZ near Honolulu for a very intensive splashdown and the capsize of the capsule and it took several minutes until the underside attached balloons swelled. If during this time water gets into the capsule, the astronauts would have been danger to life. Thus, the last Apollo mission was ended more rustic than gentle. Thus ended the era of a water landing for manned space flights, because in 1981 the shuttle's like a plane landed.
The Apollo-Soyuz Test Project was the first and last joint space mission between the two states until the fall of the USSR and in the margins, there were a number of notable features. Such was the American astronaut Robert Overmyer (1936-1996), who later on STS 5 and STS 51b mitflog, active as a supporter in Moscow. Unfortunately, this promising collaboration was not pursued, perhaps because then it was no program in which both nations would be able to work together. It was only after 1990, for example, in the Atlantis-MIR flights possible.
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