query: how many times did apollo 11 orbit the moon before landing

pos: Apollo 11 Richard Nixon viewed the launch from his office in the White House with his NASA liaison officer, Apollo astronaut Frank Borman. Saturn V AS-506 launched Apollo 11 on July 16, 1969, at 13:32:00 UTC (9:32:00 EDT). It entered Earth orbit at an altitude of by , twelve minutes later. After one and a half orbits, the S-IVB third-stage engine pushed the spacecraft onto its trajectory toward the Moon with the trans-lunar injection (TLI) burn at 16:22:13 UTC. About 30 minutes later, with Collins in the left seat and at the controls, the transposition, docking, and extraction maneuver was performed. This

neg: Apollo 10 Apollo 10 Apollo 10 was the fourth manned mission in the United States Apollo space program, and the second (after Apollo 8) to orbit the Moon. Launched on May 18, 1969, it was the F mission: a "dress rehearsal" for the first Moon landing, testing all of the components and procedures, just short of actually landing. The Apollo Lunar Module (LM) was flown to a descent orbit within of the lunar surface, at the point where powered descent for landing would normally begin. Its success enabled the first landing to be attempted on the Apollo 11 mission two months later.

neg: Apollo 10 Apollo 10 Apollo 10 was the fourth manned mission in the United States Apollo space program, and the second (after Apollo 8) to orbit the Moon. Launched on May 18, 1969, it was the F mission: a "dress rehearsal" for the first Moon landing, testing all of the components and procedures, just short of actually landing. The Apollo Lunar Module (LM) was flown to a descent orbit within of the lunar surface, at the point where powered descent for landing would normally begin. Its success enabled the first landing to be attempted on the Apollo 11 mission two months later.

neg: Marshall Space Flight Center stage and, when in orbit, unfolded to present 2,300-square-feet (210-m) of instrumented surface. Three Pegasus satellites were launched during 1965, and stayed in orbit from 3 to 13 years. The overall Apollo Program was the largest scientific and engineering research activity in history. The actual landing on the Moon led to investigations that could have only been conducted on location. There were six Apollo missions that landed on the Moon: Apollo 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, and 17. Apollo 13 had been intended as a landing, but only circled the Moon and returned to Earth after an oxygen tank ruptured

neg: Clifford E. Charlesworth until 1970. He served as the Flight Director on Gemini 11 and Gemini 12, and as one of the Flight Directors on Apollo 8, the first mission to orbit the Moon; Apollo 11, the first mission to land on the Moon; and Apollo 12, the second Moon landing mission. From 1970 to 1972 he was manager of the Earth observation satellite program. He then worked as Deputy Head of the Payload Section of the Space Shuttle program, as Deputy Director of the Johnson Space Center, and as Director of Space Operations before he retired in 1988. For his services to

neg: Space exploration Crewed exploration of the Moon began in 1968 with the Apollo 8 mission that successfully orbited the Moon, the first time any extraterrestrial object was orbited by humans. In 1969, the Apollo 11 mission marked the first time humans set foot upon another world. Crewed exploration of the Moon did not continue for long, however. The Apollo 17 mission in 1972 marked the sixth landing and the most recent human visit there, and the next, Exploration Mission 2, is due to orbit the Moon in 2023. Robotic missions are still pursued vigorously. The exploration of Mars has been an important

neg: Moon landing conspiracy theories early 1968, NASA secretly approached Kubrick to direct the first three Moon landings. The launch and splashdown would be real but the spacecraft would stay in Earth orbit and fake footage broadcast as "live from the Moon." No evidence was offered for this theory, which overlooks many facts. For example, "2001" was released before the first Apollo landing and Kubrick's depiction of the Moon's surface differs greatly from its appearance in the Apollo footage. The movement of characters on the Moon in "2001" differs from that of the filmed movement of Apollo astronauts, and does not resemble an environment with

neg: Journey of Apollo 15 to the Moon the first to enter into a highly inclined orbit. Previous Apollo crews had been in lunar orbits that were just over equatorial regions. The Descent Orbit Insertion (DOI) burn was performed behind the Moon on the second orbit. This burn placed them into a 58.8 by 9.5 nautical mile (108.9 by 17.6 km) orbit, with the low point over Hadley Rille landing site. On Apollo 11 and Apollo 12 this burn was done by the Lunar Module after it had undocked from the Command/Service Module. From Apollo 14 onwards it was done by the CSM as a way of conserving

neg: Apollo 12 Apollo 12 Apollo 12 was the sixth manned flight in the United States Apollo program and the second to land on the Moon. It was launched on November 14, 1969, from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, four months after Apollo 11. Commander Charles "Pete" Conrad and Lunar Module Pilot Alan L. Bean performed just over one day and seven hours of lunar surface activity while Command Module Pilot Richard F. Gordon remained in lunar orbit. The landing site for the mission was located in the southeastern portion of the Ocean of Storms. Unlike the first landing on Apollo 11, Conrad

neg: Kennedy Space Center Apollo 8's lunar orbiting mission. The next two missions tested the Lunar Module: Apollo 9 (Earth orbit) and Apollo 10 (lunar orbit). Apollo 11, launched from Pad A on July 16, 1969, made the first Moon landing on July 20. Apollo 12 followed four months later. From 1970–1972, the Apollo program concluded at KSC with the launches of missions 13 through 17. On May 14, 1973, the last Saturn V launch put the Skylab space station in orbit from Pad 39A. By this time, the Cape Kennedy pads 34 and 37 used for the Saturn IB were decommissioned, so Pad

neg: Moon landing Apollo 12 lunar landings and rock returns had already taken place by then. In total, twenty-four U.S. astronauts have traveled to the Moon. Three have made the trip twice, and twelve have walked on its surface. Apollo 8 was a lunar-orbit-only mission, Apollo 10 included undocking and Descent Orbit Insertion (DOI), followed by LM staging to CSM redocking, while Apollo 13, originally scheduled as a landing, ended up as a lunar fly-by, by means of free return trajectory; thus, none of these missions made landings. Apollo 7 and Apollo 9 were Earth-orbit-only missions. Apart from the inherent dangers of manned

neg: Moon close-up pictures; the Lunar Orbiter program produced maps of the entire Moon; the Surveyor program landed its first spacecraft four months after "Luna 9". The manned Apollo program was developed in parallel; after a series of unmanned and manned tests of the Apollo spacecraft in Earth orbit, and spurred on by a potential Soviet lunar flight, in 1968 Apollo 8 made the first manned mission to lunar orbit. The subsequent landing of the first humans on the Moon in 1969 is seen by many as the culmination of the Space Race. Neil Armstrong became the first person to walk on

neg: Moon landing conspiracy theories missions, NASA released information to the public explaining where and when the spacecraft could be sighted. Their flight paths were tracked using radar and they were sighted and photographed using telescopes. Also, radio transmissions between the astronauts on the surface and in orbit were independently recorded. The presence of retroreflectors (mirrors used as targets for Earth-based tracking lasers) from the Laser Ranging Retroreflector Experiment (LRRR) is evidence that there were landings. Lick Observatory attempted to detect from Apollo 11's retroreflector while Armstrong and Aldrin were still on the Moon but did not succeed until August 1, 1969. The Apollo 14

neg: Essex-class aircraft carrier and "Princeton" recovered the second crew to orbit the Moon, aboard Apollo 10, in May 1969. "Hornet" rejoined the program and recovered the astronauts from the first two moon landing missions, Apollo 11 in July 1969 and Apollo 12 in November. The first steps on Earth of returning astronauts Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Mike Collins, are marked on her hangar deck, as part of her Apollo program exhibit. The three subsequent missions utilized amphibious assault ships as support vessels; however, "Ticonderoga" recovered the astronauts of the last two moon missions, Apollo 16 and Apollo 17 in April and December

neg: Free-return trajectory return in the event of a systems failure; this was applied in the Apollo 8, Apollo 10, and Apollo 11 lunar missions. In such a case a free return to a suitable reentry situation is more useful than returning to near the Earth, but then needing propulsion anyway to prevent moving away from it again. Since all went well, these Apollo missions did not have to take advantage of the free return and inserted into orbit upon arrival at the Moon. Due to the landing-site restrictions that resulted from constraining the launch to a free return that flew by the

neg: Apollo 11 lunar sample display Western Samoa, Yemen, Yugoslavia, and Zambia. Once the goodwill display with the Moon material was presented NASA offered no counseling or recommendations on how the caretaker or curator was to handle the Moon rocks. Their fate was in the hands of the recipient, which in many cases was not well managed. NASA did not give away any Moon rock displays other than what was given of the Apollo 11 and Apollo 17 Moon rock displays. Certain samples of Moon rock and lunar dust soil from the Apollo 11 and Apollo 17 missions, mounted on the wooden plaque displays especially for

neg: Apollo 11 and a lunar module (LM) that had two stages – a descent stage for landing on the Moon, and an ascent stage to place the astronauts back into lunar orbit. After being sent to the Moon by the Saturn V's third stage, the astronauts separated the spacecraft from it and traveled for three days until they entered lunar orbit. Armstrong and Aldrin then moved into "Eagle" and landed in the Sea of Tranquillity. The astronauts used "Eagle"s ascent stage to lift off from the lunar surface and rejoin Collins in the command module. They jettisoned "Eagle" before they performed the

neg: Apollo 8 planned length of time, the crew would have appeared early from behind the Moon. Exactly at the calculated moment, however, the signal was received from the spacecraft, indicating it was in a orbit around the Moon. After reporting on the status of the spacecraft, Lovell gave the first description of what the lunar surface looked like: Lovell continued to describe the terrain they were passing over. One of the crew's major tasks was reconnaissance of planned future landing sites on the Moon, especially one in Mare Tranquillitatis that was planned as the Apollo 11 landing site. The launch time of

neg: Jamesburg Earth Station Jamesburg Earth Station The Jamesburg Earth Station is located in the rural Cachagua area of Carmel Valley, California, about southeast of Monterey. It was originally built in 1968 to support the Apollo 11 moon landing. The 10-story high, dish, driven by a Vertex-RSI 7210 drive system, served for about 35 years as the West Coast Teleport of AT&T/COMSAT's communications Satellite Network, and was the earth station serving Intelsat satellites parked in geosynchronous orbit over the Pacific Ocean. The dish played a role in capturing and distributing images of the Apollo 11 moon landing and the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989.

neg: Richard Arenstorf fuel. By staying on the Arenstorf orbit, lunar astronauts automatically return to Earth. Before leaving NASA at the first Moon Landing, Arenstorf mapped out an emergency rescue orbit, which was used in the Apollo 13 incident, in which a catastrophic malfunction forced aborting the Moon landing, but the astronauts ultimately returned safely to Earth without a major course adjustment. After the first Moon Landing, Arenstorf became a professor of mathematics at Vanderbilt University, now retired, where he specialized in celestial mechanics and analytic number theory. In number theory, one speciality was the properties of the Riemann zeta function, which allows

neg: Apollo 10 had a very small chance of receiving the Apollo 13 command if he did an outstanding job with the assignment, which he did not. Eisele, despite his issues with management, was always intended for future assignment to the Apollo Applications Program (which was eventually cut down to only the Skylab component) and not a lunar mission. This dress rehearsal for a Moon landing brought the Apollo lunar module to from the lunar surface, at the point where powered descent would begin on the actual landing. Practicing this approach orbit would refine knowledge of the lunar gravitational field needed to calibrate

neg: Apollo 11 countries and included visits with prominent leaders such as Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom. Many nations honored the first human Moon landing with special features in magazines or by issuing Apollo 11 commemorative postage stamps or coins. On September 16, 1969, the three astronauts spoke before a joint session of Congress. They presented two US flags, one to the House of Representatives and the other to the Senate, that had been carried to the surface of the Moon with them. The flag of American Samoa which was taken to the Moon by Apollo 11 is on display at

neg: Apollo 11 maneuvers that blasted them out of lunar orbit on a trajectory back to Earth. They returned to Earth and splashed down in the Pacific Ocean on July 24 after more than eight days in space. Armstrong's first step onto the lunar surface was broadcast on live TV to a worldwide audience. He described the event as "one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind." Apollo 11 effectively ended the Space Race and fulfilled a national goal proposed in 1961 by President John F. Kennedy: "before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and

neg: Moon landing were a hoax; however, empirical evidence is readily available to show that manned Moon landings did occur. Anyone on Earth with an appropriate laser and telescope system can bounce laser beams off three retroreflector arrays left on the Moon by Apollo 11, 14 and 15, verifying deployment of the Lunar Laser Ranging Experiment at historically documented Apollo Moon landing sites and so proving equipment constructed on Earth was successfully transported to the surface of the Moon. In addition, in August 2009 NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter began to send back high resolution photos of the Apollo landing sites. These photos show

neg: Apollo program stands alone in sending manned missions beyond low Earth orbit. Apollo 8 was the first manned spacecraft to orbit another celestial body, while the final Apollo 17 mission marked the sixth Moon landing and the ninth manned mission beyond low Earth orbit. The program returned of lunar rocks and soil to Earth, greatly contributing to the understanding of the Moon's composition and geological history. The program laid the foundation for NASA's subsequent human spaceflight capability and funded construction of its Johnson Space Center and Kennedy Space Center. Apollo also spurred advances in many areas of technology incidental to rocketry and

neg: Gene Cernan Apollo 7—although that flight carried no lunar module. Standard crew rotation put him in place as the Lunar Module Pilot on Apollo 10—the final dress rehearsal mission for the first Apollo lunar landing—on May 18–26, 1969. During the Apollo 10 mission, Cernan and his commander, Tom Stafford, piloted the Lunar Module "Snoopy" in lunar orbit to within of the lunar surface, successfully executing every phase of a lunar landing up to final powered descent and providing NASA planners with critical knowledge of technical systems and lunar gravitational conditions to enable Apollo 11 to land on the Moon two months later.

neg: Docking and berthing of spacecraft The Apollo program depended on lunar orbit rendezvous to achieve its objective of landing men on the Moon. This required first a transposition, docking, and extraction maneuver between the Apollo Command/Service Module (CSM) mother spacecraft and the Lunar Module (LM) landing spacecraft, shortly after both craft were sent out of Earth orbit on a path to the Moon. Then after completing the lunar landing mission, two astronauts in the LM had to rendezvous and dock with the CSM in lunar orbit, in order to be able to return to Earth. The spacecraft were designed to permit intra-vehicular crew transfer through

neg: Apollo 10 on the Moon, we couldn't have gotten off." On May 22, 1969 at 20:35:02 UTC, a 27.4 second LM descent propulsion system burn inserted the LM into a descent orbit of so that the resulting lowest point in the orbit occurred about 15° from lunar landing site 2 (the Apollo 11 landing site). The lowest measured point in the trajectory was above the lunar surface at 21:29:43 UTC. Shortly after trans-lunar injection, Young performed the transposition, docking, and extraction maneuver, separating the command and service module (CSM) from the S-IVB stage, turning around, and docking its nose to the top

neg: Luna 15 Luna 15 Luna 15 was an unmanned space mission of the Soviet Luna programme. On 21 July 1969, while Apollo 11 astronauts finished the first human moonwalk, Luna 15, an unmanned Soviet spacecraft in lunar orbit at the time, began its descent to the lunar surface. Launched three days before the Apollo 11 mission, it was the second Soviet attempt to return lunar soil back to Earth with a goal to outstrip the US in achieving a sample return in the Moon race. The previous mission, designated E-8-5-402, launched June 14, 1969, did not achieve Earth orbit because the third

neg: Lunar orbit rendezvous 1965 and 1966 on six Project Gemini missions with the aid of radar and on-board computers. It was also successfully done each of the eight times it was tried on Apollo missions. When the Apollo Moon landing program was started in 1961, it was assumed that the three-man Command and Service Module combination (CSM) would be used for takeoff from the lunar surface, and return to Earth. It would therefore have to be landed on the Moon by a larger rocket stage with landing gear legs, resulting in a very large spacecraft (in excess of ) to be sent to

neg: Moon landing conspiracy theories develop the technology to do so. For example, he claims that, during the Apollo program, the USSR had five times more manned hours in space than the United States, and notes that the USSR was the first to achieve many of the early milestones in space: the first man-made satellite in orbit (October 1957, Sputnik 1); the first living creature in orbit (a dog named Laika, November 1957, Sputnik 2); the first man in space and in orbit (Yuri Gagarin, April 1961, Vostok 1); the first woman in space (Valentina Tereshkova, June 1963, Vostok 6); and the first spacewalk (EVA)

neg: NASA These missions returned a wealth of scientific data and of lunar samples. Topics covered by experiments performed included soil mechanics, meteoroids, seismology, heat flow, lunar ranging, magnetic fields, and solar wind. The Moon landing marked the end of the space race; and as a gesture, Armstrong mentioned mankind when he stepped down on the Moon. Apollo set major milestones in human spaceflight. It stands alone in sending manned missions beyond low Earth orbit, and landing humans on another celestial body. Apollo 8 was the first manned spacecraft to orbit another celestial body, while Apollo 17 marked the last moonwalk and

neg: Apollo 15 German stamp dealer after their return. Ironically, this mission was one of very few that had been honored with the issue of a commemorative US stamp, with this first use of a lunar rover happening one decade after the launch of the first manned Mercury mission. In 1962, NASA contracted for fifteen Saturn V Moon rockets to achieve the Apollo program's goal of a manned landing on the Moon by 1970; at the time no one knew how many missions would be required to achieve this. Since success was obtained with the sixth Saturn V on Apollo 11, nine rockets

neg: NASA a flight around the Moon in December 1968. Shortly before, the Soviets had sent an unmanned spacecraft around the Moon. On the next two missions docking maneuvers that were needed for the Moon landing were practiced and then finally the Moon landing was made on the Apollo 11 mission in July 1969. The first person to stand on the Moon was Neil Armstrong, who was followed by Buzz Aldrin, while Michael Collins orbited above. Five subsequent Apollo missions also landed astronauts on the Moon, the last in December 1972. Throughout these six Apollo spaceflights, twelve men walked on the Moon.

neg: Apollo Lunar Module times were maximized on the last four landing missions by using the Service Module engine to perform the initial descent orbit insertion burn 22 hours before the LM separated from the CSM, a practice begun on Apollo 14. This meant that the complete spacecraft, including the CSM, orbited the Moon with a perilune, enabling the LM to begin its powered descent from that altitude with a full load of descent stage propellant, leaving more reserve propellant for the final approach. The CSM would then raise its perilune back to the normal . The extended lunar module (ELM) used on the

neg: Lunar orbit rendezvous who had been holding out for direct ascent, that LOR was the only way to land on the Moon by 1969. With the key players inside NASA lined up behind the concept, Webb approved LOR in July 1962. The decision was officially announced at a press conference on July 11, 1962. President Kennedy's science adviser, Jerome Wiesner, remained firmly opposed to LOR. Lunar orbit rendezvous Lunar orbit rendezvous (LOR) is a key concept for efficiently landing humans on the Moon and returning them to Earth. It was utilized for the Project Apollo missions in the 1960s and 1970s. In a

neg: History of spaceflight out by NASA. The programs goal was to orbit and land manned vehicles on the moon. The program ran from 1969 to 1972. Apollo 8 was the first manned spaceflight to leave earth orbit and orbit the Earth's moon on December 21, 1968. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first men to set foot on the moon during the Apollo 11 mission on July 20, 1969. The Skylab programs goal was to create the first space station of NASA. The program marked the last launch of the Saturn V rocket on May 19, 1973. Many experiments were performed on

neg: Apollo program of the U. S. flags left on the Moon during the Apollo missions were found to still be standing, with the exception of the one left during the Apollo 11 mission, which was blown over during that mission's lift-off from the lunar surface and return to the mission Command Module in lunar orbit; the degree to which these flags retain their original colors remains unknown. In a November 16, 2009, editorial, "The New York Times" opined: The Apollo program has been called the greatest technological achievement in human history. Apollo stimulated many areas of technology, leading to over 1,800 spinoff

neg: Moon landing conspiracy theories MOL pilot Robert Lawrence, had no connection with the civilian manned space program that oversaw the Apollo missions. All of the deaths listed besides Welch occurred at least 20 months "before" Apollo 11 and subsequent flights. , four of the twelve Apollo astronauts who landed on the Moon between 1969 and 1972 are still alive, including Buzz Aldrin. Also, nine of the twelve Apollo astronauts who flew to the Moon without landing between 1968 and 1972 are still alive, including Michael Collins. The number of deaths within the American astronaut corps during the run-up to Apollo and during the Apollo

neg: Presidency of Lyndon B. Johnson all, the president's support for NASA never wavered. The program rebounded, and by the end of Johnson's term, two manned missions, Apollo 7 and Apollo 8 (the first to orbit the Moon), had been successfully completed. Six months after leaving office, Johnson attended the launch of Apollo 11, the first Moon landing mission. Following the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy, and Martin Luther King Jr., Johnson signed two major gun control laws. In addition to the assassinations, Johnson's push for gun control was also motivated by mass shootings such as the one perpetrated by Charles Whitman. On

neg: Space Race joined him on the surface almost 20 minutes later. Altogether, they spent just under two and one-quarter hours outside their craft. The next day, they performed the first launch from another celestial body, and rendezvoused back with "Columbia". Apollo 11 left lunar orbit and returned to Earth, landing safely in the Pacific Ocean on July 24, 1969. When the spacecraft splashed down, 2,982 days had passed since Kennedy's commitment to landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth before the end of the decade; the mission was completed with 161 days to spare. With the

neg: Moon landing around the Moon before returning safely to Earth. Apollo 10 then performed a full dress rehearsal of a manned Moon landing in May 1969. This mission orbited within altitude above the lunar surface, performing necessary low-altitude mapping of trajectory-altering mascons using a factory prototype lunar module that was too overweight to allow a successful landing. With the failure of the unmanned Soviet sample return Moon landing attempt Luna 15 in July 1969, the stage was set for Apollo 11. Plans for manned Moon exploration originated during the Eisenhower administration. In a series of mid-1950s articles in "Collier's" magazine, Wernher von

neg: Lunar Orbital Platform-Gateway space-systems engineer's standpoint, a stupid architecture". Griffin further stated that the "Gateway is useful when, but not before, we are manufacturing propellant on the Moon and shipping it up to a depot in lunar orbit" and that "we should be, with all deliberate speed, returning to the Moon and learning how to utilize the resources of our nearest Earth-orbit object." During a meeting of the National Space Council Users' Advisory Group, former Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin voiced his criticisms of the Lunar Gateway. Aldrin stated that he is "quite opposed to the Gateway" and that "using the Gateway as

neg: Powered Descent Initiation long shadows of the moon, they would unleash decelerating thrust and begin slowing their speed for the touchdown...this was it. PDI. Powered Descent Initiate." Powered Descent Initiation Powered Descent Initiation (PDI) is a term used during the Apollo program Moon landing missions to describe the maneuver of the Apollo Lunar Module as it descended from lunar orbit to landing. ""Eagle" was GO to ignite its descent engine, and Armstrong and Aldrin locked their eyes to the glowing numbers displayed before them. They were almost at an invisible junction of height, speed, range, and time when everything would join together for

neg: Apollo 21 in orbit. Some people have speculated that tentative plans of an "Apollo 21" might have been made assuming availability of the extra Saturn V that would have left, although by the time NASA resumed planning manned missions using this numbering sequence (defined on April 24, 1967), the dual-Saturn IB plan had been replaced with the single Saturn V. There is no evidence NASA ever planned an eleventh Moon landing mission. Apollo 21 "Apollo 21" is an apocryphal reference to an eleventh manned Moon landing mission of NASA's Apollo program. Apollo contracted for the construction of fifteen Saturn V launch vehicles

neg: Apollo program All missions were commanded by Gemini or Mercury veterans. Crews on all development flights (except the Earth orbit CSM development flights) through the first two landings on Apollo 11 and Apollo 12, included at least two (sometimes three) Gemini veterans. Dr. Harrison Schmitt, a geologist, was the first NASA scientist astronaut to fly in space, and landed on the Moon on the last mission, Apollo 17. Schmitt participated in the lunar geology training of all of the Apollo landing crews. NASA awarded all 32 of these astronauts its highest honor, the Distinguished Service Medal, given for "distinguished service, ability, or

neg: Moon landing in 2014 and Astrobotic Technology plans to launch in the second half of 2016 with their own rover plus another team's lunar rovers from Hakuto. In 2019, a consortium of Vodafone, Audi and PT Scientists are planning a Moon landing. The mission is to launch a lander and two small rovers to the Moon from Cape Canaveral, Florida on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket during the 50th-anniversary year of NASA's Apollo 11 Moon landing. Nokia will assist to setup a LTE network to manage lunar terrestrial communication system of the mission. Many conspiracy theorists hold that the Apollo Moon landings

neg: Sputnik crisis Project Apollo and the first humans to land on the Moon in 1969. Campaigning in 1960 on closing the "missile gap", Eisenhower's successor John F. Kennedy decided to deploy 1,000 Minuteman missiles. This was many more ICBMs than the Soviets had at the time. Though Kennedy did not favor a massive U.S. manned space program while in the U.S. Senate during Eisenhower's term, public reaction to the Soviet's launching the first human into orbit, Yuri Gagarin, on April 12, 1961 led Kennedy to raise the stakes of the Space Race by setting the goal of landing men on the Moon.

neg: Moon landing conspiracy theories in popular culture 1, 1956, a full five years before Yuri Gagarin's first manned spaceflight. Moon landing conspiracy theories in popular culture The notion that the Apollo Moon landings were hoaxes perpetrated by NASA and other agencies has appeared many times in popular culture. Not all references to Moon landing conspiracy theories are in support of them, but the ideas expressed in them have become a popular meme to reference, both in humor and sincerity. In 1956 James E. Gunn wrote a science fiction story entitled "Cave of Night" in which the United States Air Force fakes the first manned American spaceflight. When

neg: 1960s the Apollo 8 crew (Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, William Anders) being the first manned mission to orbit another celestial body (the moon) during Christmas of 1968. On 20 July 1969, Apollo 11, the first human spaceflight landed on the Moon. Launched on 16 July 1969, it carried mission Commander Neil Armstrong, Command Module Pilot Michael Collins, and the Lunar Module Pilot Buzz Aldrin. Apollo 11 fulfilled President John F. Kennedy's goal of reaching the moon by the end of the 1960s, which he had expressed during a speech given before a joint session of Congress on 25 May 1961: "I

neg: Moon landing conspiracy theories Apollo 11 data tapes containing telemetry and the high-quality video (before scan conversion from slow-scan TV to standard TV) of the first moonwalk are also missing. Dr. David R. Williams (NASA archivist at Goddard Space Flight Center) and Apollo 11 flight director Eugene F. Kranz both acknowledged that the original high-quality Apollo 11 telemetry data tapes are missing. Conspiracists see this as evidence that they never existed. The Apollo 11 telemetry tapes were different from the telemetry tapes of the other Moon landings because they contained the raw television broadcast. For technical reasons, the Apollo 11 lander carried a slow-scan

neg: Moon landing conspiracy theories an interview on space.com. In 2002, Alex R. Blackwell of the University of Hawaii pointed out that some photos taken by Apollo astronauts while in orbit around the Moon show the landing sites. "The Daily Telegraph" published a story in 2002 saying that European astronomers at the Very Large Telescope (VLT) would use it to view the landing sites. According to the article, Dr. Richard West said that his team would take "a high-resolution image of one of the Apollo landing sites." Marcus Allen, a conspiracist, answered that no photos of hardware on the Moon would convince him that manned

neg: Mass concentration (astronomy) with Oceanus Procellarum does not possess a positive gravitational anomaly. Because of its mascons, the Moon has only four "frozen orbit" inclination zones where a lunar satellite can stay in a low orbit indefinitely. Lunar subsatellites were released on two of the last three Apollo manned lunar landing missions in 1971 and 1972; the subsatellite PFS-2 released from Apollo 16 was expected to stay in orbit for one and a half years, but lasted only 35 days before crashing into the lunar surface. It was only in 2001 that the mascons were mapped and the frozen orbits were discovered. Since

neg: Apollo 10 of the lunar module (LM), before separating from the S-IVB. Apollo 10 was the first mission to carry a color television camera inside the spacecraft, and made the first live color TV transmissions from space. After reaching lunar orbit three days later, Young remained in the command module (CM) "Charlie Brown" while Stafford and Cernan entered the LM "Snoopy" and flew it separately. The LM crew performed the descent orbit insertion maneuver by firing their descent engine, and tested their craft's landing radar as they approached the altitude where powered descent would begin on Apollo 11. They surveyed the landing

neg: Apollo 11 part that returned to Earth; a service module (SM), which supported the command module with propulsion, electrical power, oxygen, and water; and a lunar module (LM) that had two stages – a descent stage for landing on the Moon, and an ascent stage to place the astronauts back into lunar orbit. This choice of mode meant that the spacecraft could be launched by a single Saturn V rocket that was then under development. Technologies and technics required for Apollo were developed by Project Gemini. Project Apollo was abruptly halted by the Apollo 1 fire on January 27, 1967, in which

neg: Apollo 10 of the LM. Cernan has said he observed the horizon spinning eight times over, indicating eight rolls of the spacecraft under ascent engine power. While the incident was downplayed by NASA, the roll was just several revolutions from being unrecoverable, which would have resulted in the LM crashing into the lunar surface. After being jettisoned, "Snoopy's" ascent stage engine was fired to fuel depletion, sending it on a trajectory past the Moon into a heliocentric orbit. The Apollo 11 ascent stage was left in lunar orbit to eventually crash; all subsequent ascent stages were intentionally steered into the Moon to

neg: Moon landing conspiracy theories propaganda or science fiction, and many thought that it had been the Russians that landed on the Moon. Moon landing conspiracy theories Moon landing conspiracy theories claim that some or all elements of the Apollo program and the associated Moon landings were hoaxes staged by NASA, possibly with the aid of other organizations. The most notable claim is that the six manned landings (1969–72) were faked and that 12 Apollo astronauts did not actually walk on the Moon. Various groups and individuals have made claims since the mid-1970s that NASA and others knowingly misled the public into believing the landings

neg: Colonization of the Moon the Apollo 12 mission landed next to the Surveyor 3 spacecraft, demonstrating precision landing capability. The use of a manned vehicle on the Moon's surface was demonstrated in 1971 with the Lunar Rover during Apollo 15. Apollo 16 made the first landing within the rugged lunar highlands. However, interest in further exploration of the Moon was beginning to wane among the American public. In 1972, Apollo 17 was the final Apollo lunar mission, and further planned missions were scrapped at the directive of President Nixon. Instead, focus was turned to the Space Shuttle and crewed missions in near Earth orbit.

neg: We choose to go to the Moon a week after Kennedy's assassination. The idea of a joint Moon mission was abandoned after Kennedy's death, but the Apollo Project became a memorial to him. His goal was fulfilled in July 1969, with the successful Apollo 11 Moon landing. This accomplishment remains an enduring legacy of Kennedy's speech, but his deadline demanded a necessarily narrow focus, and there was no indication of what should be done next once it was achieved. Apollo did not usher in an era of lunar exploration, and no further missions were sent to the Moon after Apollo 17 in 1972. Subsequent planned Apollo missions

neg: Oscar Holderer V testing and oversaw the tunnel's construction at the Marshall Space Flight Center. The Saturn V later powered Apollo 11 on its successful moon landing. Describing the project many years later, Holderer said the historical significance of the project was not felt at the time, but that he "was amazed when [he] heard what they had in mind." The same wind tunnel is still used by NASA for testing as of 2015. Holderer was promoted several times and found he did not like management. "I'm a hands-on man," he said. "I had been promoted .. [had] too many people under

neg: Apollo 8 for that reason. On September 20, 1967, NASA adopted a seven-step plan for Apollo missions, with the final step being a Moon landing. Apollo 4 and Apollo 6 were "A" missions, tests of the Saturn V launch vehicle using an unmanned Block I production model of the command and service module (CSM) in Earth orbit. Apollo 5 was a "B" mission, a test of the LM in Earth orbit. Apollo 7, scheduled for October 1968, would be a "C" mission, a manned Earth-orbit flight of the CSM. Further missions depended on the readiness of the LM. It had been decided

neg: Apollo 11 three astronauts died, and the subsequent investigation. In October 1968, Apollo 7 evaluated the command module in Earth orbit, and in December Apollo 8 tested it in lunar orbit. In March 1969, Apollo 9 put the lunar module through its paces in Earth orbit, and in May Apollo 10 conducted a "dress rehearsal" in lunar orbit. By July 1969, all was in readiness for Apollo 11 to take the final step onto the Moon. The Soviet Union competed with the US, but were hampered by repeated failures in development of their N1 launcher, which was comparable to the Saturn V.

neg: Powered Descent Initiation Powered Descent Initiation Powered Descent Initiation (PDI) is a term used during the Apollo program Moon landing missions to describe the maneuver of the Apollo Lunar Module as it descended from lunar orbit to landing. ""Eagle" was GO to ignite its descent engine, and Armstrong and Aldrin locked their eyes to the glowing numbers displayed before them. They were almost at an invisible junction of height, speed, range, and time when everything would join together for commitment. When the instruments told them that they were 192 miles from their projected landing site, and were precisely 50,174 radar~measured feet above the

neg: Jerome Wiesner reasons Weisner did not want to send man into space. When NASA decided in June 1962 on Lunar Orbit Rendezvous as the strategy for its Apollo program to meet Kennedy's goal of landing men on the Moon by the end of the 1960s, Wiesner had created a Space Vehicle Panel, chaired by Nicolas Golovin, to monitor and second-guess NASA. The SVP forced NASA to defend its decision to develop the Saturn V launch vehicle and a Lunar Excursion Module, delaying its announcement news conference to July 11, and causing NASA Administrator James E. Webb to hedge by calling the decision

neg: Third-party evidence for Apollo Moon landings party observers could expect to see the various craft at specific times according to scheduled launch times and planned trajectories. The Soviet Union monitored the missions at their Space Transmissions Corps, which was "fully equipped with the latest intelligence-gathering and surveillance equipment." Vasily Mishin, in an interview for the article "The Moon Programme That Faltered," describes how the Soviet Moon programme dwindled after the Apollo landing. The missions were tracked by radar from several countries on the way to the Moon and back. A group at Kettering Grammar School, using simple radio equipment, monitored Soviet and U.S. spacecraft and calculated

neg: BlastOff! Corporation perspective to show the Rover itself on the surface of the Moon. The destination of the Rover and Scouts was to be one of the NASA Apollo landing sites, most likely the Apollo 11 landing site (the first manned landing on the Moon). The mission was designed to land the Rover and Scouts as close to the Apollo site as possible at the beginning of that site's local lunar day. This would provide a two-week time period with continuous sunlight to power the Rover and Scouts before the two-week lunar night would effectively end the mission by causing the batteries

neg: Space archaeology work already have surfaced. Though its mission isn't primarily archaeological, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter has imaged all of the Apollo landing sites as well as rediscovering the location of the first Lunokhod 1 rover, lost since 1971 (note: all of the U. S. flags left on the moon during the Apollo missions were found to still be standing, with the exception of the one left during the Apollo 11 mission, which was blown over during that mission's lift-off from the lunar surface and return to the mission command module in lunar orbit; the degree to which these flags are preserved

neg: Third-party evidence for Apollo Moon landings of the Moon landing really is. The NASA-independent "Observatoire de la Côte d'Azur", McDonald, Apache Point, and Haleakalā observatories regularly use the Apollo LRRR. Lick Observatory attempted to detect from Apollo 11's retroreflector while Armstrong and Aldrin were still on the Moon but did not succeed until August 1, 1969. The Apollo 14 astronauts deployed a retroreflector on February 5, 1971, and McDonald Observatory detected it the same day. The Apollo 15 retroreflector was deployed on July 31, 1971, and was detected by McDonald Observatory within a few days. The image on the left shows what is considered some of

neg: Space Race a successful piloted test flight in low Earth orbit on Apollo 9 in March 1969. The next mission, Apollo 10, conducted a "dress rehearsal" for the first landing in May 1969, flying the LM in lunar orbit as close as above the surface, the point where the powered descent to the surface would begin. With the LM proven to work well, the next step was to attempt the landing. Unknown to the Americans, the Soviet Moon program was in deep trouble. After two successive launch failures of the N1 rocket in 1969, Soviet plans for a piloted landing suffered delay.

neg: Direct ascent Direct ascent Direct ascent is a method of landing a spacecraft on the Moon or another planet directly, without first assembling the vehicle in Earth orbit, or carrying a separate landing vehicle into orbit around the target body. It was proposed as the first method to achieve a manned lunar landing in the United States Apollo program, but was rejected because it would have required developing a prohibitively large launch vehicle. It was used to launch uncrewed lunar landers in the United States Surveyor program and the Soviet Luna program. The Apollo program was initially planned based on the assumption

neg: Apollo Lunar Module The first manned lunar landing occurred on July 20, 1969 with the Apollo 11 LM "Eagle". Four days later, the Apollo 11 crew in the Command Module "Columbia" splashed down in the Pacific Ocean, completing President John F. Kennedy's goal "before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth." This was followed by precision landings on Apollo 12 "(Intrepid)" and Apollo 14 "(Antares)".In April 1970, the Apollo 13 lunar module "Aquarius" played an unexpected role in saving the lives of the three astronauts after an oxygen tank in the service

neg: Moon the Moon as the commander of the American mission Apollo 11 by first setting foot on the Moon at 02:56 UTC on 21 July 1969. An estimated 500 million people worldwide watched the transmission by the Apollo TV camera, the largest television audience for a live broadcast at that time. The Apollo missions 11 to 17 (except Apollo 13, which aborted its planned lunar landing) returned of lunar rock and soil in 2,196 separate samples. The American Moon landing and return was enabled by considerable technological advances in the early 1960s, in domains such as ablation chemistry, software engineering, and

neg: Apollo 17 lunar sample display Switzerland, Syria, Taiwan, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, Upper Volta, Uruguay, Vatican City, Venezuela, Vietnam, Western Samoa, Yemen, Yugoslavia, and Zambia. Once the goodwill display with the Moon material was given, NASA offered no counseling or recommendations on how the caretaker or curator was to handle the Moon rocks. Their fate was in the hands of the recipient, which in many cases was not well managed. NASA did not give away as gifts any other Moon rock displays other than what was presented of the Apollo 11 and Apollo 17

neg: Stolen and missing Moon rocks a piece of petrified wood.."… "The museum acquired the rock after the death of former prime minister Willem Drees in 1988. Drees received it as a private gift on October 9, 1969 from then-US ambassador J. William Middendorf during a visit by the three Apollo 11 astronauts, part of their ‘Giant Leap’ goodwill tour after the first moon landing." The museum acknowledged that though they did vet the moon rock they failed to double check it. The museum was under the incorrect belief that this Moon rock was one of the 135 Apollo 11 Moon rocks that were presented to

neg: Apollo (spacecraft) Moon and return to lunar orbit, and was the first true "spaceship" since it flew solely in the vacuum of space. It consisted of a "descent stage" and an "ascent stage". It supplied life support systems for two astronauts for up to four to five days on the Apollo 15, 16 and 17 missions. The spacecraft was designed and manufactured by the Grumman Aircraft Company. The descent stage contained the landing gear, landing radar antenna, descent propulsion system, and fuel to land on the Moon. It also had several cargo compartments used to carry, among other things: the Apollo Lunar

neg: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Moon earth orbit. "Bart has misinterpreted things that are immediately obvious to anyone who has extensively read Apollo history and documentation or anyone who has ever been inside an Apollo Command Module or accurate mockup," says McDade. A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Moon A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Moon is a 2001 film written, produced and directed by Nashville-based filmmaker Bart Sibrel. Sibrel is a critic of the Apollo program and proponent of the conspiracy theory that the six Apollo Moon landing missions between 1969 and 1972 were elaborate hoaxes perpetrated by the

neg: Moon landing fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke forecast that man would reach the Moon by 1978. On 16 August 2006, the Associated Press reported that NASA is missing the original Slow-scan television tapes (which were made before the scan conversion for conventional TV) of the Apollo 11 Moon walk. Some news outlets have mistakenly reported that the SSTV tapes were found in Western Australia, but those tapes were only recordings of data from the Apollo 11 Early Apollo Surface Experiments Package. Scientists believe the six American flags planted by astronauts have been bleached white because of more than 40 years of exposure

neg: Apollo Lunar Module the Moon via Lunar Orbit Rendezvous (LOR) instead of the direct ascent or Earth Orbit Rendezvous (EOR) methods. Both direct ascent and EOR would have involved landing a much heavier, complete Apollo spacecraft on the Moon. Once the decision had been made to proceed using LOR, it became necessary to produce a separate craft capable of reaching the lunar surface and ascending back to lunar orbit. In July 1962, eleven firms were invited to submit proposals for the LEM. Nine companies responded in September, answering 20 specific questions posed by the NASA RFP in a 60-page limited technical proposal. Grumman

neg: Apollo 14 tanks and the addition of a third tank. The launch had been scheduled for October 1, and was delayed about While Shepard and Mitchell were on the surface, Roosa remained in lunar orbit aboard the command and service module "Kitty Hawk", performing scientific experiments and photographing the Moon, including the landing site of the future Apollo 16 mission. He took several hundred seeds on the mission, many of which were germinated on return, resulting in the so-called Moon trees. Shepard, Roosa, and Mitchell landed in the Pacific Ocean on February 9. Shepard was the oldest U.S. astronaut when he made

neg: Space policy of the United States of his term in 1968. Apollo 11, the first Moon landing, occurred early in Richard Nixon's presidency, but NASA's budget continued to decline and three of the planned Apollo Moon landings were cancelled. The Nixon administration approved the beginning of the Space Shuttle program, but did not support funding of other projects such as a Mars landing, colonization of the Moon, or a permanent space station. On January 5, 1972, Nixon approved the development of NASA's Space Shuttle program, a decision that profoundly influenced American efforts to explore and develop space for several decades thereafter. Under the Nixon administration, however,

neg: Apollo 15 Mission Control to conclude that the burn had taken place. When contact resumed, Scott did not immediately give the particulars of the burn, but spoke admiringly of the beauty of the Moon, causing Alan Shepard, the Apollo 14 commander, who was awaiting a television interview, to grumble, "To hell with that shit, give us details of the burn." The 398.36-second burn took place at 078:31:46.7 into the mission at an altitude of above the Moon, and placed Apollo 15 in an elliptical lunar orbit of . On Apollo 11 and 12, the lunar module decoupled from the CSM and descended

neg: The Leslie Cantwell Collection write the actual instructions he had conveyed to the crew. The Apollo 13 images give a unique perspective of a moment when the world held its breath at history was made. Other images in the collection are no less haunting or poignant: an image of an Apollo 11 earth orbit is brought to life by a 35-word inscription by Buzz Aldrin of the ‘silent communion’ prayer he uttered shortly after landing on the moon, or Al Worden’s inscription on an image from the Apollo 15 archives of his poem “Blast Off” (from his book, Hello Earth, Greetings from Endeavour) -

neg: Apollo 11 involved separating "Columbia" from the spent S-IVB stage, turning around, and docking with "Eagle" still attached to the stage. After the LM was extracted, the combined spacecraft headed for the Moon, while the rocket stage flew on a trajectory past the Moon. This was done to avoid colliding with the spacecraft, the Earth, or the Moon. A slingshot effect from passing around the Moon threw it into an orbit around the Sun. On July 19 at 17:21:50 UTC, Apollo 11 passed behind the Moon and fired its service propulsion engine to enter lunar orbit. In the thirty orbits that followed,

neg: Farouk El-Baz he participated in the discovery of El-Morgan, the first offshore oil field in the Gulf of Suez. The key scientist who helped NASA plan and identify the Moon landing location for Apollo 11 historic moon landing in 1969, El-Baz is currently a leading expert in the study of deserts and how to find and sustain water in such environments in the Arab world. From 1967 to 1972, El-Baz participated in the Apollo Program as Supervisor of Lunar Science Planning at Bellcomm Inc., a division of AT&T that conducted systems analysis for NASA. During these six years, he was Secretary of

neg: Direct ascent that direct ascent would be used. This would have required developing an enormous launch vehicle, either the Saturn C-8 or Nova rocket, to launch the three-man Apollo spacecraft, with an attached landing module, directly to the Moon, where it would land tail-first and then launch off the Moon for the return to Earth. The other two options that NASA considered required a somewhat smaller launch vehicle, either the Saturn C-4 or C-5. These were Earth Orbit Rendezvous, which would have involved at least two launches to assemble the direct-landing and return vehicle in orbit; and Lunar Orbit Rendezvous (LOR), which

neg: Apollo 8 as early as May 1967 that there would be at least four additional missions. Apollo 8 was planned as the "D" mission, a test of the LM in a low Earth orbit in December 1968 by James McDivitt, David Scott, and Russell Schweickart, while Borman's crew would fly the "E" mission, a more rigorous LM test in an elliptical medium Earth orbit as Apollo 9, in early 1969. The "F" Mission would test the CSM and LM in lunar orbit, and the "G" mission would be the finale, the Moon landing. Production of the LM fell behind schedule, and when

neg: Operation Avalanche (film) the Apollo 11 Moon landing a secret, with a plan to cover the problem by shooting down the Apollo 11 capsule (killing the real astronauts) and blaming the Soviets. When the young agents learn that the Moon mission can execute everything but the lunar landing itself, they become involved in a plot to use their AV skills to fake the landing portion. As their operation continues to a successful conclusion, the team becomes increasingly paranoid that they are being watched, by either the mole or by the CIA itself. As the Apollo 11 mission nears, the team buries copies of

neg: Direct ascent much like a smaller version of the spider-like Lunar Module, although OKB-52 continued to develop the UR-700 modular booster for the direct ascent LK-700 ship. Science fiction movies such as "Destination Moon" had frequently depicted direct ascent missions. Direct ascent Direct ascent is a method of landing a spacecraft on the Moon or another planet directly, without first assembling the vehicle in Earth orbit, or carrying a separate landing vehicle into orbit around the target body. It was proposed as the first method to achieve a manned lunar landing in the United States Apollo program, but was rejected because it

neg: Journey of Apollo 15 to the Moon begin their landing. Journey of Apollo 15 to the Moon Launched at 9:34:00 am EST on July 26, 1971, Apollo 15 took four days to reach the Moon. After spending two hours in orbit around the Earth, the S-IVB third stage of the Saturn V was reignited to send them to the Moon. During the retrieval of the Lunar Module (LM) from its stowed position below the Command/Service Module (CSM), a light came on on the control panel that indicated the valves of the Service Propulsion System were open and the engine should be firing. A short was found in

neg: Buzz Aldrin maneuver was performed: this involved separating the command module "Columbia" from the spent S-IVB stage, turning around, and docking with lunar module "Eagle". After the lunar module was extracted, the combined spacecraft headed for the Moon, while the rocket stage flew on a trajectory past the Moon. On July 19 at 17:21:50 UTC, Apollo 11 passed behind the Moon and fired its service propulsion engine to enter lunar orbit. In the thirty orbits that followed, the crew saw passing views of their landing site in the southern Sea of Tranquillity about southwest of the crater Sabine D. At 12:52:00 UTC

neg: Lunar plaque the Moon, except the two for the aborted Apollo 13 mission which did not land on the Moon. Lunar plaque The Lunar plaques are stainless steel commemorative plaques measuring attached to the ladders on the descent stages of the United States Apollo Lunar Modules flown on lunar landing missions Apollo 11 through Apollo 17, to be left permanently on the lunar surface. The plaques were originally suggested and designed by NASA's head of technical services Jack Kinzler, who oversaw their production. All of the plaques bear facsimiles of the participating astronauts' signatures. For this reason, an extra plaque had to

neg: Journey of Apollo 15 to the Moon to perform a small trim burn to raise this. This was done on the opposite side of the Moon to their landing site at the end of their ninth orbit of the Moon. It was a 20-second burn of the Reaction Control System (RCS) and added 3.1 ft/s (0.94 m/s) to their speed. It raised the lowest point of their orbit to about 9.6 nm (17.8 km). During the eleventh orbit, Scott and Irwin began to transfer to "Falcon". The crew spent the period behind the Moon activating the LM and general housekeeping in preparation for the undocking. They also

neg: Far side of the Moon 17 missions since that time, and photographed by multiple lunar probes. Spacecraft passing behind the Moon were out of direct radio communication with the Earth, and had to wait until the orbit allowed transmission. During the Apollo missions, the main engine of the Service Module was fired when the vessel was behind the Moon, producing some tense moments in Mission Control before the craft reappeared. Geologist-astronaut Harrison Schmitt, who became the last to step onto the Moon, had aggressively lobbied for his landing site to be on the far side of the Moon, targeting the lava-filled crater Tsiolkovskiy. Schmitt's ambitious

neg: Reduced muscle mass, strength and performance in space of the Apollo Program, from pre-lunar flights (missions 7 through 10); the first lunar landing (mission 11), and five subsequent lunar exploratory flights (mission 12 through 17). Apollo 13 did not complete its intended lunar landing mission because of a pressure vessel explosion in the Service Module. Instead, it returned safely to Earth after attaining a partial lunar orbit. Essential to the successful completion of the Apollo Program was the requirement for some crew members to undertake long and strenuous periods of extravehicular activity (EVA) on the lunar surface. There was concern about the capability of crew members to accomplish

neg: Lunar orbit an apolune of and a perilune of . Then the orbit was circularized at around to obtain suitable imagery. Five such spacecraft were launched over a period of thirteen months, all of which successfully mapped the Moon, primarily for the purpose of finding suitable Apollo program landing sites. The most recent was the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE), which became a ballistic impact experiment in 2014. The Apollo program's Command/Service Module (CSM) remained in a lunar parking orbit while the Lunar Module (LM) landed. The combined CSM/LM would first enter an elliptical orbit, nominally by , which was

neg: Lunar orbit rendezvous Lunar orbit rendezvous Lunar orbit rendezvous (LOR) is a key concept for efficiently landing humans on the Moon and returning them to Earth. It was utilized for the Project Apollo missions in the 1960s and 1970s. In a LOR mission, a main spacecraft and a smaller lunar lander travel to lunar orbit. The lunar lander then independently descends to the surface of the Moon, while the main spacecraft remains in lunar orbit. After completion of the mission there, the lander returns to lunar orbit to rendezvous and re-dock with the main spacecraft, then is discarded after transfer of crew and

neg: Salyut 1 Salyut 1 Salyut 1 (DOS-1) (; English translation: Salute 1) was the first space station of any kind, launched into low Earth orbit by the Soviet Union on April 19, 1971. The Salyut program followed this with five more successful launches out of seven more stations. The final module of the program, Zvezda (DOS-8) became the core of the Russian segment of the International Space Station and remains in orbit. Salyut 1 originated as a modification of the military Almaz space station program then in development. After the landing of Apollo 11 on the Moon in July 1969, the Soviets

neg: Moon landing conspiracy theories according to Dr. Williams. Copies of those tapes have been found. Others are looking for the missing telemetry tapes for different reasons. The tapes contain the original and highest quality video feed from the Apollo 11 landing. Some former Apollo personnel want to find the tapes for posterity while NASA engineers looking towards future Moon missions believe the tapes may be useful for their design studies. They have found that the Apollo 11 tapes were sent for storage at the U.S. National Archives in 1970, but by 1984, all the Apollo 11 tapes had been returned to the Goddard Space

neg: John Young (astronaut) crew flew to the Moon on Apollo 10. While Stafford and Cernan flew the Lunar Module in lunar orbit for the first time, Young flew the Command Module solo. Apollo 10 set the record for the highest speed attained by any manned vehicle at during its return to Earth on May 26, 1969. Young was backup commander of Apollo 13, the troubled mission in which the Moon landing was aborted because of an explosion in the Service Module. By rotation, Young became commander of Apollo 16, and studied geology with his crew while preparing for the mission. Apollo 16's lunar

neg: Apollo 21 Apollo 21 "Apollo 21" is an apocryphal reference to an eleventh manned Moon landing mission of NASA's Apollo program. Apollo contracted for the construction of fifteen Saturn V launch vehicles used to launch the Apollo spacecraft to the Moon, and achieved the first manned landing with the sixth one (Apollo 11), leaving nine for follow-on lunar missions, through Apollo 20. However, budget cuts caused NASA to cancel the last three missions, ending the lunar program after Apollo 17. One Saturn V was used to launch the Skylab space station, and parts of the other two became museum displays. An "Apollo

neg: Moon landing conspiracy theories Kennedy's 1961 goal, "before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth." In fact, NASA accounted for the cost of Apollo to the US Congress in 1973, totaling US$25.4 billion. Mary Bennett and David Percy have claimed in "Dark Moon: Apollo and the Whistle-Blowers", that, with all the known and unknown hazards, NASA would not risk broadcasting an astronaut getting sick or dying on live television. The counter-argument generally given is that NASA in fact "did" incur a great deal of public humiliation and potential political opposition to the program