Outposts on the Frontier: A Fifty-Year History of Space Stations (Outward Odyssey: A People's History of Spaceflight)

by Jay Chladek

  The Saga of Ironman One

  At this time, another “space program” of sorts was capturing public attention. It was the motion picture Marooned, based on the novel written by Martin Caidin. In the movie, three astronauts aboard an Apollo spacecraft called Ironman One at the conclusion of a mission to an orbiting space station are stranded in orbit when their service module’s main engine fails to perform a deorbit burn. NASA and Air Force technicians rush to prepare a rocket with an experimental spacecraft to rescue the stranded crewmembers before their oxygen runs out. At the climax, a Russian spacecraft appears, and its cosmonaut renders aid to the stranded astronauts until the rescue craft arrives. While the movie was not a big financial success in the fall of 1969, it did strike a chord with many people, and it is considered a cult classic to this day.

  One of the men it influenced was Dr. Philip Handler, then president of the National Academy of Sciences. Handler took part in an official visit to the Soviet Union to meet directly with Keldysh a few weeks before the COSPAR meeting in Leningrad. Like his colleagues at NASA, Dr. Handler also welcomed increased cooperation with the Soviets in scientific endeavors. Dr. Handler had been encouraged to discuss space cooperation with the Soviets in informal talks he had with both Webb and Paine but to not necessarily get his hopes up that anything would come of it.

  While NASA’s official handling of such matters with the Soviets tended to be done with kid gloves at high levels of diplomacy and protocol, Handler was rather blunt in his approach when he brought up the movie’s portrayal of a fictional cosmonaut to the Soviets. As Handler described the incident in a NASA history interview, the fact that “an American film should portray a Soviet cosmonaut as the hero who saves an American’s life came to them as a visible and distinct shock.”

  The topic of pursuing a common docking system that could be used in the rescue of crewmembers from each country’s spacecraft was discussed. A group of young scientists who attended the meeting with Handler and Keldysh expressed enthusiasm for such a project, while Keldysh himself was more guarded, as he was not in a position to give an answer on the matter just yet. But Keldysh asked Handler if he could perhaps wait for a response in a few days. Handler agreed and kept quiet on what was discussed when he returned to the United States. A few weeks later at his office at the National Academy of Sciences, Handler took delivery of a note from the Soviet Embassy. The note specified that after consulting with the appropriate groups, the Presidium of the Soviet Science Academy was prepared to discuss common docking mechanisms for space stations. This was the potential opportunity that NASA was looking for.

  Paine decided to go a step further and actually proposed that a Soyuz-compatible docking device could be installed on Skylab to potentially allow Soviet spacecraft to dock with it. While Paine didn’t necessarily believe the Soviets would support that idea, he submitted it to show that NASA was sincere in its efforts and willing to go further than just simple discussions where nothing would actually happen in the end. Many letters were exchanged between Keldysh and Paine as the issue changed from a personal matter between two officials to an official dialog between two countries. Paine retired from NASA soon after this, but he reiterated in letters to Keldysh that he was retiring for personal reasons only. Officially, NASA still wanted to take part in a joint mission with the Soviets.

  Proposal of a Docking Mission

  As part of an agreement with the Soviets, five men from NASA journeyed to Moscow. From Houston, the group included center director Bob Gilruth; Caldwell Johnson, a mechanical and electrical systems engineer of exceptional skill from the original Langley NASA Space Task Group; and flight director Glynn Lunney, who was knowledgeable in orbital mechanics and rendezvous techniques. Joining them would be George Hardy from the Skylab program at Marshall and Arnold Frutkin, NASA assistant administrator for international affairs. Frutkin had the most knowledge of previous NASA efforts with the Soviets, as he had been involved in running NASA’s Office of International Relations since the early 1960s. Accompanying the group was William Krimer, a Russian-language interpreter from the State Department. The intent for this first group was to provide the Soviets with information about NASA’s capabilities, without necessarily giving too many technical details, lest accusations be made that NASA was giving away secrets.

  This first contingent flew to Moscow on 24 October 1970. They wondered what would greet them as they were briefed by intelligence and State Department officials not to get their hopes up or to expect much. The concerns of a cold reception abated once they arrived. On that first night in Moscow, the Soviets gave their guests a welcome dinner and took them to see several sites, including a Soviet space museum.

  On the next day at their first visit to Star City, the delegation met high-ranking members of the Soviet manned space program. General Kunetsov was there, as were Soviet cosmonauts Beregovoy and Shatalov. The American contingent was allowed to tour the simulators used by the cosmonauts in their training. This was the first chance anyone from NASA, outside a couple of astronauts, had to inspect this equipment up close, and the American engineers considered it a highlight of their trip.

  NASA officials met scientist-cosmonaut and Soyuz spacecraft designer Konstantin Feoktistov as both sides began two days of hardware and capability briefings. Lunney gave the first presentation into NASA’s capabilities, while Feoktistov discussed the Soviet ones. Caldwell Johnson’s presentation about American docking hardware came next. He also showed images of a proposed androgynous docking system in addition to the Apollo ones.

  The term “androgynous” means possession of both male and female characteristics in life science matters and has engineering and electrical applications. The docking elements of both the Apollo and the Soyuz vehicles used a probe and drogue mechanism, with the probe being the “male” element and the drogue housing being the “female” element. The androgynous system replaces both elements with a universal mechanism found on both docking spacecraft. Guide petals on the outside of the docking tunnel align the mechanism, and capture latches secure the system into place for a hard dock. At the time Johnson made his proposal to the Soviets, this concept was being considered for the shuttle program.

  After Johnson’s talk, Soviet engineer Vladimir Syromyatnikov briefed the Americans on the previously used Soyuz docking system and revealed the one they intended for use in their DOS station program with the internal tunnel. This was a pretty bold revelation, given that the DOS program was still in development. But the Soviets only said the design would be used in the near future, and they didn’t make mention of the DOS program to the Americans. After a lunch break, George Hardy gave a talk on the Skylab program, which the Soviets watched with much interest.

  During a party at the U.S. Embassy, the two engineering teams got to know each other in a more relaxed environment. Indications were it was less like two countries’ teams meeting each other and more like two groups of colleagues in the same field who hadn’t met in a long time getting together. Bob Gilruth and Feoktistov hit it off well, as both had been involved in their respective space programs since the earliest days.

  The next day included further discussions about Skylab and guidance equipment. At the conclusion, further agreements were hashed out on additional topics needing discussion and what information should be exchanged on future technical matters. Both sides decided to create three integrated working groups of engineers and specialists from both countries to handle the technical matters. Each group would have a different set of technical challenges to overcome if a docking mission were going to happen.

  An agreement was drawn up by Feoktistov and, with minor revisions, was signed the next day. Even with the concerns of bureaucratic red tape getting in the way, things seemed to move pretty smoothly. While there was a language barrier, both teams found that they shared more similarities than differences. If all went well, the engineering teams would meet again in six months, this time in Houston.

  This didn’t mean that the project w
as a go, as it was still only the first meeting. NASA would still have to justify the mission in budget proposals to Congress. NASA engineers also had to determine if a proposed hardware development schedule drawn up by Feoktistov could be met in the appropriate time. Given NASA’s full plate in late 1970, with work taking place on Skylab, on redesigning hardware after the near disaster of Apollo 13, on space shuttle design proposals, and on plans for the next lunar flights, it is amazing that a proposal for such a joint mission was even being considered at the time.

  George Low journeyed with a NASA negotiating team to Moscow in January of 1971 to meet with Keldysh. Among their topics of discussion was a possible docking mission. Feoktistov was also present at these meetings, to discuss the Soviet hardware’s technical aspects if such a mission were flown. While both Keldysh and Feoktistov said they didn’t have the authority to commit the Soviet Union to such a mission, both expressed that they were in favor of doing it.

  In preparation for this meeting, NASA drafted some docking-mission studies using the new data acquired from the Soviets. The ideas considered were either for directly docking an Apollo craft with an internally modified Soyuz or for using a separate module between the two spacecraft. Whichever method was selected, some sort of an airlock would be needed since Apollo spacecraft still operated with a pure-oxygen environment at an internal pressure of 5 psi, while the Soyuz used oxygen and nitrogen at about 14.7 psi (atmospheric pressure at sea level). An airlock is required because if a person goes directly from high pressure in an oxygen-nitrogen environment to lower pressure, nitrogen gas bubbles form in the blood and tissues, causing decompression sickness. To prevent this, a cosmonaut would need to prebreathe pure oxygen for a couple of hours inside the airlock to flush nitrogen from the body before reducing the pressure.

  The Apollo spacecraft could not handle anything over 8 psi, or the internal-pressure vessel would rupture. The Soyuz spacecraft could theoretically operate at a lower pressure, although the potential fire danger brought about by a pure-oxygen environment concerned the Soviets greatly. Lowering the pressure in a Soyuz too far would require some major rework, and the mission’s intention was to try to minimize changes as much as possible.

  Ultimately, it was decided that a new airlock and docking module would be developed. That way any atmospheric changes during crew transfers could be localized to this module. Inside it, crewmembers could prebreathe as needed, and the environment to one spacecraft could be sealed off while open to the other one. The module could also act as an additional space for mounting communications and guidance equipment unique to the mission, meaning that the Apollo and Soyuz spacecraft themselves wouldn’t need as many modifications. As a side benefit, some additional experiments could be flown in the new module as well. So after the docking mission had concluded, the Apollo could stay aloft to conduct a few more days of dedicated science gathering before returning home.

  A nineteen-person Soviet delegation led by academician Boris Petrov arrived in Houston for their next scheduled meeting less than a week after the Soyuz 11 crew successfully docked with the first Salyut space station. It was during this second meeting that the Soviet delegation revealed that going with a universal docking system of a type similar to what Caldwell Johnson had proposed was preferable to using an off-the-shelf one. Their decision surprised the Americans, but Johnson was encouraged by what he heard.

  Over the next few days of joint design and discussion, it looked like a docking mission was possible. The language barrier between the two groups was eased somewhat by the fact that some members of the Soviet delegation both spoke and wrote English. But none of the Americans spoke Russian, and they had to make their points through interpreters to the Soviet team members who did not speak English. One final formality before the Houston sessions were concluded was the appointment of project directors from each country. Representing NASA would be Glynn Lunney, and representing the Soviet side would be Konstantin Bushuyev. It would be up to these two men to jointly approve the various design and hardware aspects of the docking mission, should the project officially be approved for flight by their respective governments.

  There was also the question of what measurements to use. American aerospace engineering had settled on using the English-based inch-and-foot system for measurements, while the Soviets used metrics. Early on in the discussions, it was decided that metrics would be used by both sides, so it would take a bit of conversion work on the American side during equipment design. Metric measurements would also be used on orbit for callouts of speed and distance during joint-docking operations.

  After the meeting, the NASA officials held a press conference to discuss what had taken place. There were concerns by some in the press that NASA might be giving away knowledge to the Soviets. That stance was downplayed, though, as these early meetings were merely discussions about how such a joint mission might take place if it were approved rather than about an approved program with a mandated technology exchange. One reporter also questioned what these discussions with the Soviets might mean for the world. Bob Gilruth replied, “Well, I think you’d have to decide that for yourselves. None of us here are politicians or politically inclined people. I think we are all impressed with the fact, however, that we have been able to meet with the delegation from the Soviet Union in an area of great technical difficulty, work together, and with a friendly atmosphere come to a number of important general agreements, and I think that it’s always good when people can meet and work together in harmony.”

  When the Soviet delegation returned to the Soviet Union, the cosmonauts of Soyuz 11 had spent twenty days in space. But a few days later, the crew was dead after their craft depressurized during reentry. There was much speculation in the West as to what had happened. While the Soviets had conducted a thorough investigation into the cause, they weren’t as completely open with the results as many members of NASA and Congress would have liked at that time. Still, the Soviets gave NASA a lot of details on what had happened. Assurances were made that the tragedy would not affect continued plans for a possible docking mission. Ultimately, Soyuz 11 was a reminder of the unforgiving nature of spaceflight, where a simple oversight can have lasting repercussions and can cause death to people, regardless of country of origin.

  Docking System and Airlock Module

  The working group tasked with development of a universal docking system settled on an arrangement similar to Caldwell Johnson’s androgynous concept. Either side of the docking collar could be used in active or passive modes during docking operations. When Johnson visited Moscow a few months later with the American members of his working group, he was pleasantly surprised to find that Vladimir Syromyatnikov and the Soviet members had been working hard on the design, using elements discussed since the first meeting in October 1970. Like the American system, it made use of a petal arrangement to align the docking collars, but it utilized three petals instead of Johnson’s original four. While the new design incorporated some additional changes, Johnson felt that the configuration was sound and that the detail differences could be worked out easily enough. The new docking device would be unlike anything that had been used before and would be a true meshing of American and Soviet engineering principles, both literally and figuratively.

  The docking module itself was also taking shape. It would be a cylindrical-shaped module capable of holding two crewmembers. One side would dock with the Apollo craft via Apollo’s normal probe-and-drogue assembly, while the other end would use the new docking system. The docking module would be carried aloft by a Saturn IB launch vehicle, in the same spot normally occupied by a lunar module. Once orbit was achieved, the Apollo CSM would dock and then extract the module from the S-IVB rocket stage before beginning rendezvous maneuvers with the Soyuz.

  Naturally, a couple of big concerns on the U.S. side questioned what this program would cost and what off-the-shelf equipment it would use. The Skylab program had been assigned a Saturn V and three Saturn IB boosters. If all went well with
Skylab plans, it would leave two surplus Saturn IB boosters available for the docking mission (one primary and one backup). Top NASA management decided that the cost of this project should not exceed $250 million.

  There were four Apollo CSMs that could potentially be used for this mission. One was the rescue CSM assigned to Skylab (CSM 119); one was a leftover Apollo spacecraft similar to what was used on the early lunar missions (CSM 111); and the other two were unfinished Apollo CSMs, each with a SIM experiment bay in their service modules (CSM 115 and 115A). While it would have been nice to use the SIM bay capabilities for additional science experiments, the projected cost to finish these spacecraft would have exceeded the available budget. So CSM 111 became the primary craft used in the joint mission; CSM 119 would act as the backup, provided it wasn’t called on for a Skylab rescue. At least three docking modules would be built for testing, flight, and backup purposes.

  Top NASA officials felt that it was a good idea to at least push for one more mission utilizing Apollo hardware. NASA was ramping up its efforts to get Congress to approve the development of the space shuttle. The most optimistic projections showed that the shuttle would not be ready for its first flights until five years after the last planned Skylab crew’s launch. If NASA endorsed a docking mission with the Soviets, the hardware could be ready to fly by 1975. From a support standpoint, one more mission would help keep the engineering, support, and design teams at NASA and the contractors together for a little longer during the gap between the last Apollo and the first shuttle missions.