Sept 20 1975
From The Space Library
20 September-5 October: Apollo-Soyuz Test Project astronauts Thomas P. Stafford, Vance D. Brand, and Donald K. Slayton and their families visited the U.S.S.R., joining Soviet ASTP cosmonauts Aleksey A.
Leonov and Valery N. Kubasov and their families for a goodwill tour of the Soviet Union. The two crews had not met since they said goodbye in space during their historic mission [see 15-24 July]. After greetings at the Moscow airport with wide grins, bear hugs, and back slaps, Stafford told the airport crowd in Russian, "We are very pleased to be back in the Soviet Union again. Now we can say our joint work has been fulfilled successfully. I am confident that our flight will serve progress and peace on earth." During the welcoming ceremonies Boris Petrov, U.S.S.R. Chairman of the Intercosmos Council, told the Americans, "The Soviet people were glad to see your success and are eager to welcome you on earth and in the Soviet Union." The astronauts, cosmonauts, and their families visited Star City on 21 Sept. to thank the Soviet space community for its work on the ASTP mission. "For 2 years Star City was a second home to us," Stafford told the crowd of Soviet space workers. "Thank you for all your work." The astronauts' families laid flowers at the memorial to Yuri Gagarin, first man to fly in space. Stafford, Brand, and Slayton presented Star City with a plaque bearing the Soviet and American flags and exchanged other gifts with the Soviets.
On 22 September Leonid I. Brezhnev, General Secretary of the Communist Party Central Committee, met the ASTP astronauts and cosmonauts at the Great Kremlin Palace, greeting each as "hero" and congratulating them on their historic mission, saying it would "pave the way for generations to come to go on with this work." During the 35min reception he told the crews of his hope for a treaty to limit nuclear arms. "Both sides-the United States and the Soviet side-should make every possible effort for good, neighborly relations, really good, in all aspects, from every point of view," he said.
On 23 Sept. the two crews and their families began a six-city tour of the Soviet Union that took them to Leningrad, Kiev, Volgograd, Novosibirsk, Sochi, and Tbilisi. Everywhere the crews were swamped by enthusiastic spontaneous crowds of up to 3000 persons waiting on corners and at airports for hours to cheer the spacemen. "The hospitality is fantastic," Stafford remarked at Volgograd. The New York Times reported that each appearance of the spacemen was greeted with applause and cheering and they responded with waves and autographs.
The astronauts ended their Russian tour on 4 Sept. with a farewell press conference back in Moscow. Stafford, Brand, and Slayton praised the "enthusiastic people with warm hearts" they had met during their tour. During the press conference-held exactly 18 yr after the U.S.S.R. had launched the first manmade satellite, Sputnik 1, on 4 Sept. 1957-Stafford encouraged continued cooperation between the U.S. and U.S.S.R. in such areas as lunar and planetary exploration, space medicine, space meteorology, and earth environment.
The three U.S. astronauts and their families flew to London for an overnight stay before flying back to Houston on 5 Sept. (B Sun, 21 Sept-6 Sept 75; NYT, 21 Sept-6 Sept 75)
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