WI: Apollo 11 surface crew stranded, Soviets bring them back

EigenAtlantic

Banned
What if the Armstrong and Aldrin's excursion module suffers a critical failure which results in them getting stranded on the Moon, but then a Soviet follow-up mission recovers them and brings them safely back to Earth?

Possible ASB?
 

CarribeanViking

Definite ASB. Apollo had very limited life support endurance, the CSM for forty-two man-days and the LEM for ninety man- hours in the early version, although with factors of safety that meant that was considerably exceeded the one time it became necessary - admittedly with cannibalisation of the CSM.
A rescue mission sitting on the pad and ready to go, launch on warning ICBM-style, wouldn't get to the moon in time before their oxygen ran out.
Apollo 15 and on used a modified LEM good for a hundred and fifty man hours, but it's still nowhere near practical.
 

Dr Dee

Interesting scenario and it kind of reminds me of aspects of 'For All Mankind' and Jed Mercurio's 'Ascent'. Not much of an expert on this but I think it would need multiple PODs involving the Soviet N1 rocket not repeatedly blowing itself up and the proposed Soviet lunar lander to be capable of carrying more than one cosmonaut. Or astronaut.
 

Dr Dee

Am I right in thinking that there were proposed American rescue craft, based on Gemini as a surface shelter or as an actual lander? But they were discounted on cost and so the Apollo astronauts went to the moon without that safety net. Again, apologies if this is garbled, semi-remembered nonsense...!
 
Dolan

Dolan

Banned
let's said about the actual political implications despite the ASB-ness of the scenario, and let's say that Soviet Moon program is much more advanced than OTL, with them actually trying to beat the US on landing on the moon.

US landed first and stranded, Soviet cosmonauts, knowing the potential tragedy, proceed to land near the US Landing site , not the planned one, said "we come to help you, CYKA" while planting Soviet Flag near The American One, and despite the craft not built to hold that many people, managed to use Soviet ingenuity by throwing out many scientific modules and re-fitting Apollo's oxygen tank with duct tapes to make room for the astronauts all while they survived on what is basically starvation diet and copious amounts of vodka during the reentry.

The Rescue is a success, and US-Soviet relationship thawed to the point of mutual cooperation being possible. Cold War has been put on hold, and the word CYKA, ended up as an universal sign of friendship.
 
anotherlurker

anotherlurker

They had air for something like 50 hours, so a Soviet moon landing attempt will need to be underway and only hours away from making their own landing attempt (and some American higher up willing to make the call within that time) to even have a snowballs chance in hell to rescue them. Then there's the issue that the Soviet moon lander was just a one man capsule, so how much of the stuff inside and outside can you throw away to take two hitchhiking Astronauts with you? There's some pictures of an stripped down American moon lander reduced to the absolute necessary stuff somewhere around, it looks rather funny, and dangerous. And then in orbit does the Soviet capsule have enough fuel to rendez vouz with the American one?
 

e of pi

Dr Dee said:
Am I right in thinking that there were proposed American rescue craft, based on Gemini as a surface shelter or as an actual lander? But they were discounted on cost and so the Apollo astronauts went to the moon without that safety net. Again, apologies if this is garbled, semi-remembered nonsense...!
Click to expand...
There were concepts proposed by McDonnell (who built the Gemini), but they weren't pursued because they weren't a good solution. As noted, a rescue mission fully stacked and ready to launch on the pad couldn't arrive at the lunar surface in time, and thus it wasn't a true rescue option at all. Really, I think for McDonnell it boiled down to trying to back-door their way into getting both a lunar CSM contract and a lunar lander contract on the side after missing both contracts.
 

Johnrankins

EigenAtlantic said:
What if the Soviets sent a cosmonaut to retrieve Armstrong and Aldrin's remains?
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The Soviets were never capable of landing on the Moon in the first place so how could they rescue anyone? Why would they waste billions just to recover the remains of two dead astronauts?
 
Dolan

Dolan

Banned
Johnrankins said:
The Soviets were never capable of landing on the Moon in the first place so how could they rescue anyone? Why would they waste billions just to recover the remains of two dead astronauts?
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if the Soviets ITTL have better economy and thus, better moon landing plans, and thus is behind on matter of only days, I could see them ditching most scientific equipments in favor of scoring propaganda victory by bringing back the deceased US Astronauts' bodies and at the same time recorded as the first who successfully return.

But then, considering dead bodies did not decompose at vacuum, and there are historical tradition of leaving dead bodies laid there in Antarctica and the Himalayas, I could see the Soviet Cosmonauts simply carry some shovels and dug graves for the fallen Americans. Which is still a propaganda victory nonetheless.
 
marathag

marathag

Banned
More interesting(and more ASBish) is that the Soviets get Neil and Buzz off the surface,strapped to the outside of the LOK, but then the Soyuz 7K has its own trouble, and everyone has to pile in Columbia for the return home to Earth.
 
Georgepatton

Georgepatton

There was actually a Soviet mission that overlapped with an Apollo landing - the Luna 15 lander crashed into the Moon while Armstrong and Aldrin were on the surface for Apollo 11.

Kinda helped to set the tone about the rival accomplishments.
 
Mad Bad Rabbit

Mad Bad Rabbit

EigenAtlantic said:
What if the Soviets sent a cosmonaut to retrieve Armstrong and Aldrin's remains?
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They didn't have the capability to land a cosmonaut.

If the lander had crashed and left a debris field, and this plus the Apollo 1 fire makes the Johnson Administration cancel the Apollo program without any followup missions (unlikely) then maybe the Soviets could've conceivably sent a small lunar robot to bury the exposed remains and plant a grave marker, as a propaganda stunt. (Kruschev's angry U.N. outburst proves oddly prophetic.)
 

USS_Ward

Post said:
Well, at least it didn't crash on Armstrong and Aldrin.
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"Hey Neil, whats that... i think i see a Sickle and hammer flag on it....oh shit"

I wonder whats the political implications of having two NASA astronauts get killed by a crashing Soviet lunar probe?
 

Alanith

At best the USSR could retrieve the men's corpses. Which admittedly would still be a hell of a propaganda victory.
 
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