Apollo Moon Missions

Neil Armstrong was the first astronaut to step foot on the moon on July 20, 1969, during the Apollo 11 mission.

The Apollo Lunar Lander can not land on the Earth, as it is designed to land on the Moon where the gravity is only 1/6 as powerful.

Also, the Lunar Lander would burn up upon entering the Earth's atmosphere. Unlike the Command Module, it had no thermal protection.

The overall manned missions were called the Soviet Moonshot. Inside the Soviet Moonshot, there was the lunar orbiter program, which was called Proton/Zond, and the landing program, called N1/L3.

Buzz Aldrin was the 2nd person to walk on the moon during the Apollo 11 mission on July 20, 1969, following Neil Armstrong.

Neil Armstrong flew his mission with Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin and Michael Collins. This was not the first lunar mission, however, but it was the first lunar landing. Apollo 8 had orbited the moon in December of 1968, and Apollo 10 astronauts flew the lunar lander within 50 miles of the moon's surface as a test flight for Apollo 11's first moon landing attempt.

Richard Nixon was the president when the first man stepped on the moon on July 20, 1969.

There were a total of 17 Apollo missions that were launched by NASA between 1961 and 1972. These missions aimed to explore the Moon and further NASA's space exploration efforts.

The Apollo 1 launch pad testing accident which took the lives of Astronauts Ed White, Roger Chaffee, and Gus Grissom, led to improved launch pad testing procedures, improved QA of electrical/electronic devices, as well as safety procedures and emergency procedures for escape/egress should an accident occur. Many lessons learned from the accident are still incorporated into all Manned Flight spacecraft design and operation.

At the time, the capsule they were were in was saturated with 100% pressurized O2 - the oxygen was ignited by what is believed to be a faulty electronic device that sparked when turned on. In addition to the O2, there were other highly flammable objects in the capsule (e.g., Velcro and the spacesuits themselves), and the access hatch could not be opened for escape without much difficulty.

An estimated 600 million people watched the Apollo 11 moon landing live on television.

In the 1960s and early 1970s, the idea of humans walking on the moon gained attention and support largely due to the Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union. NASA's Apollo program, particularly after President Kennedy's 1961 speech challenging the nation to land a man on the moon, played a significant role in galvanizing public interest and support for this ambition.

The manned Apollo missions launched atop a Saturn V rocket to get into Earth orbit. After a couple orbits to get everything configured they performed what is called a TLI (Trans Lunar Injection) burn using the CSM (Command Service Module) engine and coasted through cislunar space between the Earth and the moon for three days.

Once they arrived at the moon they performed a second burn of the CSM engine, called the LOI (Lunar Orbit Insertion) burn. This parked them in orbit around the moon. Two of the astronauts on board, the Commander, or CDR, and the Lunar Module Pilot, or LMP) entered the LM (Lunar Module) and separated from the CSM, leaving the Command Module Pilot, or CMP, alone in orbit. The LM then performed its own engine burn to reduce speed and eventually land on the moon.

The LM was built in two halves. When the ground mission was over, the CDR and LMP separated the Descent stage of the LM from the Ascent stage, fired the engine, and lifted off from the moon's surface, leaving the Descent Stage on the moon. Once there they reconnected with the CSM, disconnected the LM (which then either crashed into the moon or entered a long period orbit about the sun, depending on the mission), and performed a TEI (Trans Earth Injection) burn, once again using the CSM engine.

After another three day coast through cislunar space, the CMP disconnected the Command Module from the Service Module exposing the heat shield on the bottom of the CM, entered Earth's atmosphere, and splashed down into the ocean to be recovered by the US Navy.

According to the Planetarium's website, the sample was collected on the Apollo 15 mission.

The primary mission objectives of Apollo 11 were to perform a crewed landing on the Moon, deploy scientific experiments, collect samples of lunar rocks and soil, and safely return the astronauts to Earth. Additionally, the mission aimed to demonstrate the United States' capability to accomplish a crewed lunar landing as part of the broader Apollo program.

The primary objective of the Apollo 11 mission was to land astronauts on the Moon and return them safely to Earth. The mission also aimed to collect lunar samples, conduct scientific experiments, and demonstrate the technology and capabilities needed for future lunar missions.

The first moon mission in 1969 was Apollo 11, which landed astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin on the moon. Armstrong famously became the first person to set foot on the lunar surface on July 20, 1969.

All of the Apollo missions leading up to the Apollo XI Moon landing on July 20, 1969, tested the equipment and procedures for the Apollo XI mission and those that followed it. However, the Mercury and Gemini missions also contributed to the overall knowledge concerning human spaceflight and various procedures (good and bad) that were ultimately used.

In 7,000 years

It takes at least six decimal places to accurately calculate a spacecraft's trajectory to land on the moon. This level of precision is needed to account for various gravitational forces and orbital mechanics during the lunar landing.

The most important finding from the Apollo 11 mission was that it was possible to land men on the moon and return them safely home. The observations, pictures, and samples they took beyond that were just icing on the cake.

They are poorly educated about it. To make matters worse, there are those who fake up phony-baloney books and DVDs to sell. People who would not be caught dead reading a science book, can and will buy some drool that says no one went.

Others like to pretend it didn't happen because it gives them a phony sense of being "cool", "rebellious", "ahead of everyone else". It never seems to occur to them that there is no way some McJob refugee could know more about Apollo than the 400,000 who worked on it, and that 400,000 people couldn't possibly keep a secret for 40 years.

There are web pages that explain, simply, the things that people are getting wrong. These sites will help you understand what really happened. I am posting three links for you.

The Apollo 13 capsule landed in the water because it was part of the standard recovery plan for NASA's Apollo missions. Capsules were designed to splash down in the ocean to allow for easier retrieval by recovery teams.

In 1969, astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin landed on the moon as part of NASA's Apollo 11 mission. Neil Armstrong famously became the first person to walk on the moon on July 20, 1969, uttering the famous phrase "That's one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind." They conducted experiments, collected samples, and took photographs before returning safely to Earth.

During the Apollo 13 mission in 1970, an oxygen tank exploded aboard the spacecraft, causing a critical failure in the systems. The crew had to shut down the command module and use the lunar module as a lifeboat to return safely to Earth. The mission was considered a "successful failure" as all astronauts returned home safely despite not landing on the moon.

The first moon landing was a stupendous technical achievement, and probably remains to this day the most remarkable accomplishment of the human race. It is so difficult to travel to the moon and return safely to Earth that it is quite amazing that we were able to do it. Aside from that, the moon landing was significant in a number of other ways. Because the US was able to do this when the USSR wasn't, the moon landing became part of the international public relations competition between the western world and the Soviet bloc. The Soviet Union, which always claimed to be superior to the decadent capitalist west in every way, obviously wasn't. The moon landing was also inspiring to a generation of scientists, who went on to create much more technology which has transformed the world very profoundly, since the moon landing in 1969, and which has made it possible for you & I to have this discussion on the internet.

The mammoth Saturn V 3-stage liquid fueled Lunar Launch Vehicle was responsible for the successful launch of all of the Apollo spacecraft (except of course Apollo 1, destroyed by fire on the launch pad during testing). The Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida, was specifically designed and built to assemble and service the Saturn V. When being rolled out on the crawler to the launch pad, the tip of the nose cone cleared the top of the doorway by only 6'.

With the Apollo spacecraft aboard, the Saturn V was 363' tall and 33' wide, and weighed 6,699,000 lbs. It was just 1 foot shorter than St. Paul's Cathedral in London.