John Stockton

 

New Scientist 20th February 1975. Vol 65 No 937.

Tucked away towards the back of issue 937 is a piece by Richard Lewis about the plans for a joint USA-USSR space project known as the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project ( ASTP ) which involved launching American and Russian space capsules and docking them together in Earth orbit. The plan was to launch a Soyuz capsule from Baikonur spaceport and an Apollo command/service module from Kennedy Space Center seven and a half hours later. Because Apollo and Soyuz capsules had incompatible docking systems and different cabin atmospheres, it was necessary to design an adapter module that would enable the two spacecraft to dock. Soyuz used an Oxygen and Nitrogen atmosphere at 10lb/square inch, whereas Apollo used pure oxygen at 5lb/square inch, so the module had to function as a decompression chamber as well as an docking facility.

The one-off mission was lacking any significant scientific objective.“ While the event has a certain news value as an exhibition of detente, it has become technological irrelevant because of the development of the space shuttle, the new aerospace plan, which makes both space ships obsolete.” As a largely symbolic mission intended to pave the way to future space co-operation, it was expected that the most significant moments would be televised images of American and Soviet Astronaut/cosmonauts shaking hands in space.

In 1975 the Space Shuttle was expected to be operational in 1979, but development problems delayed the launch to 1981. The Space Shuttle was eventually launched into orbit on 12 April 1981, exactly twenty yeas after Yuri Gagarin's pioneering flight on Vostock 1. The choice of the Space Shuttle flight launch date was either a tribute to the historic Soviet launch, or an attempt to demonstrate superiority over the Russian space programme (not quite in the spirit of the 1975 ASTP mission).

The Apollo capsule was available because the Apollo 18,19 and 20 missions had been cancelled by 1971, partly as a public attempt at appeasing public disquiet over the cost of manned space flight and partly because the risk of disaster. However, political expediency dictated that the $243 million cost, including $45 million for the development of the single-use adapter module, justified the ASTP mission just four years later.

In February 1975, Richard Lewis was intrigued by the ages of the ASTP astronauts. “Middle aged males around the world can take heart in the fact that the average age of the five pilots (three in Apollo, two in Soyuz) is a substantial 44 years. Donald K. Slayton, one of the Apollo pilots, is 51. The “baby” of the joint mission is 40-year-old Valeri Nikolayavich Kubasov, flight engineer of the Soyuz spacecraft.”

50 years later, it is acceptable for astronauts to be even older than this, as long as they meet fitness standards. Also, it is no longer assumed that astronauts have to be male.

“Green light for Soviet space?” on page 438 of issue 937 attempted to discern the

The unused Soviet LK module

intentions of the Soviet space programme. Dr Sarah White and Professor Grigori Tokaty outlined the military background to the early Russian space programme. Commenting on the late start to their civilian rocket development, necessitated by their need to match the American strategic advantage provided by long-range bombers based in Europe, White and Tokaty also cited the deaths of important rocket scientists ( Korolyov, Isaaev, Yangel and Babakin) as a factor in the failure to match the rapidly developed Apollo project, they erroneously repeated the propaganda line that the U.S.S.R. had never been interested in the moon-race. In 1975 was not widely known that a Russian lunar module had been developed and tested, without astronauts, but the catastrophic failures of the very large N1 rockets made missions to the Moon impossible.

After Apollo 11 won the 'moon race' in 1969 the U.S.S.R. concentrated their efforts on space stations. Salyut 1 was built quickly with low quality engineering. The first crew to visit the orbiting module died when the docking mechanism damaged the hatch of the Soyuz capsule, resulting in a fatal decompression. Although unaware of the extent of the abandoned secret Soviet Moon plans, the article is sceptical about another technical development.

“ There is, however, still some confusion over what really went wrong with Soyuz-15 last August, when it failed to dock with Salyut-3 and returned to Earth after just two days in space. General Shatalov, the Soviet cosmonaut chief, claimed it was testing an automatic docking system being developed for Soyuz's “tanker” spacecraft (these will rendezvous with manned or unmanned Salyut stations to replenish their supplies and prolong their useful life in orbit). The system apparently worked to within 30 or 50 metres of the Salyut, but then each time something started to go wrong. According to Shatalov, the crew continued to use the automatic system so as to collect as much information on its malfunctioning as possible. Western space officials are dubious that this is the whole story.”

50 years later, automatic supply missions to the International Space Station are routine and the Soviet Union did pioneer this technology, but the idea, at the end of the article, that orbiting modules would need to be welded together in the future seems slightly odd. There then follows another article by Academician Boris Paton – director of the Institute of Electrical Welding attached to the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences, Kiev – Welding in space comes down to Earth. In the abridged version of an article that first appeared in Aviatsiya i Kosmonavtika, 1974/no 11, Boris Paton described metal welding experiments conducted in weightless conditions on aircraft that lead to the design of a Vulcan welding unit that could achieve metal cutting and welding with “electron beam, compressed ray, and fused electrode “ in space. Paton expressed the hope that the developments would eventually be useful on Earth.

BBC Nationwide 21st February 1975