On This Day in Space! July 15, 1975: Apollo-Soyuz launches joint US-Soviet space mission, ,
On July 15, 1975, the first joint space mission between the United States and the Soviet Union blasted off into orbit. They called it the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project. This mission ceremoniously marked the end of the space race.
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Astronaut Donald K. Deke Slayton embraces cosmonaut Aleksey Leonov in the Soyuz spacecraft during the Apollo-Soyuz mission between the U.S. and USSR in July 1975. (Image credit: NASA)First, Russian cosmonauts Alexey Leonov and Valery Kubasov lifted off from Kazakhstan. A few hours later, NASA astronauts Thomas Stafford, Vance Brand and Donald “Deke” Slayton lifted off from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center in an Apollo command module.
Two days later, the spacecraft rendezvoused and docked in orbit, and the two crews greeted each other with what became the first international handshakes to happen in space.
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