Apollo-Soyuz: first docking between craft of two countries
Apolo-Soyuz: primer acoplamiento entre naves de dos países
- Date
- 17 de julio de 1975 · confidence high
- Place
- Kennedy Space Center, Florida, United States
- Credited to
- NASA and the USSR Academy of Sciences
- Field
- Movement
What was discovered
An Apollo and a Soyuz craft docked in orbit for two days using an adaptor jointly designed, the first universal docking system. It was the first joint crewed mission of the United States and the USSR.
Soyuz 19 lifted off from Baikonur and Apollo from Kennedy Space Center; the docking took place in Earth orbit. It is placed at Kennedy as the US launch centre.
What it led to
- the APAS and later androgynous docking systems (IDSS)
- the Shuttle-Mir (1995-1998) and ISS programmes
- a thaw in the space race (détente)