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The link title is ambiguous. It's the first time that China has docked two crafts in orbit. Good for them. The first time that two spacecraft have ever docke
by winestock 15y ago
The link title is ambiguous. It's the first time that China has docked two crafts in orbit. Good for them.
The first time that two spacecraft have ever docked in orbit was, I believe, the Gemini/Soyuz joint missions in the middle of the previous century.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- nhoss2 15y agoI think your referring to the apollo soyuz project, but that was not the first time two spacecraft have docked. I can't remember specifically the first time that two spacecraft docked, but in terms of manned US, I think it was gemini 8. But I'm pretty sure unmanned spacecraft have docked before that and the russians may have done it before the americans have
- smithian 15y agoYou're thinking of Appollo-Soyuz, which happened in the 70's. the first space docking was in the Gemini program, Gemini 8, which docked to an american Agena upperstage.
- Roboprog 15y agoThe Chinese vehicles in the article were robotic. The electronics did the docking, not a pilot. That seems like a reasonable accomplishment, even if somebody in "The West" has done it before.
- Arjuna 15y ago"The Chinese vehicles in the article were robotic. The electronics did the docking, not a pilot." The Kosmos 186 and Kosmos 188 docking, achieved by the USSR in 1967, was unmanned and completely automated.