🚀 Apollo-Soyouz - Une rencontre au sommet

Video from the channel Stardust - La Chaîne Air & Espace about Apollo–Soyuz, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 21:40. Language: French. Video type: Documentary.

French-language episode that reconstructs the Apollo-Soyuz mission, from the technical problems and preparation to the later lives of its crew members. It uses memories from Leonov and Dave Scott read by several voices. It presents it as the first diplomatic date in space.

In the early 1970s, NASA had a small budget and made use of leftover material from the lunar program, such as the Skylab station, launched in 1973. With détente, Nixon and Brezhnev signed an agreement in 1972 for a joint mission, mainly symbolic. There were two technical obstacles. Both spacecraft used a male docking system, so an androgynous port was designed. They also had different cabin pressures, so a docking module was built. That module traveled in place of the lunar module, next to the S-IVB stage, and served as an airlock to equalize pressure and atmosphere. The American side was commanded by Tom Stafford, with two Gemini flights and Apollo 10. Deke Slayton, one of the Mercury Seven, had been grounded by a heart problem and was finally flying sixteen years after his selection. Vance Brand, selected in 1966, was also on his first flight. The Soviet side was made up of Alexei Leonov, the first man to walk in space in 1965, and Valeri Kubasov, a veteran of Soyuz 6. Both had been removed from Soyuz 11, whose crew died from a depressurization. The crews met at the Le Bourget Air Show in 1973 and trained together in both countries.

Soyuz 19 launched on 15 July 1975, and Apollo followed seven and a half hours later on a Saturn IB with command module 111. After docking there was a handshake over France, a conversation with Gerald Ford and a joke by Leonov: tubes labeled as vodka that actually contained borscht. They also exchanged seeds, flags and certificates. On 19 July, Apollo produced an artificial eclipse so the Soviets could observe the solar corona. Soyuz landed on the 21st and Apollo returned on the 24th. During reentry, toxic gases entered the cabin, Brand handed out the oxygen masks, and the crew spent two weeks hospitalized. Leonov was promoted to general. Today command module 111 is on display at the California Science Center in Los Angeles, and the Soyuz capsule is at the Energia museum. On 29 June 1995, Atlantis docked with Mir.