Omega Speedmaster Apollo Soyuz

In 1975, the Apollo and Soyuz capsules became the first ever spacecraft to meet and dock in space. 

For America and Russia, it represented the possibility of thawing Cold War tensions.

When Commanders Stafford and Leonov

embraced and shook hands, they, and the rest of the crew, wore OMEGA Speedmasters - one side set to Houston, the other to Baikonur time.

Soon after this mission, the Speedmaster was adopted as the official watch of the Russian Space Agency, mirroring the certification extended by NASA ten years earlier. 

To commemorate this milestone event in 1976, made exclusively for the italian market, Omega presented a limited edition of 500 pieces with very unique characteristics. The Speedmaster Apollo Soyuz was based on the classic Moonwatch reference 145.022 with calibre 861, fitting in a very specific serial range between 39’180’xxx and 39’181’xxx .

The most striking feature of the watch is the unique dial configuration, stripped of any Speedmaster indication but rather bearing the mission logo at 12 o’clock, a detail that will inspire many future limited editions placing the mission logo in the continuous second counter. Upon closer inspection we notice features from the calibre 321 era Speedmasters, such as the longer tritium indices compared to those of the same period.

Another unique feature of the watch are the larger pushers, which were 0.5mm larger than regular pushers, meaning the pusher slot in the case is also slightly larger.

The caseback is also unique to the watch, engraved with the mission medallion and the letter “I” followed by a progressive limited numbering.