Soyuz 22

Soyuz 22 was an earth-sciences mission using a modified Soyuz capsule that had served as a backup for the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project mission the previous year.

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Cosmonauts Valery Bykovsky and Vladimir Aksyonov spent a week in orbit photographing the surface of the Earth with a specially-built camera. It was hoped that these observations would assist in identifying resources and assisting in economic planning.

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Unusual for a Soyuz was the orbit — inclined at 64.75? — an inclination that had not been used since the Voskhod program. The reason for this was simple — it maximised the ground covereage, especially of East Germany.

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The main payload was an East German built Carl Zeiss-Jena multi-spectral camera. This was mounted in the place of the androgonous docking system at the front of the Orbital Module. One cosmonaut would control the operations of the camera from inside the Orbital Module while the second changed the orientation from the Descent Module.

Soyuz: Soyuz is Russian for "Union". Depending on the context, Soyuz may also refer to any of the following:...

Apollo-Soyuz Test Project: The Apollo-Soyuz Test Project was the first joint flight of the US and Soviet space programs. The Apollo Spacecraft and Docking Module were launched...

Valery Bykovsky: Valery Fyodorovich Bykovsky (Russian: Валерий Фёдорович Быковский; born 2 August 1934, Pavlovsky Posad) was a Soviet cosmonaut who flew three manned s...