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Apollo 9
The Apollo 9 mission was launched from Cape Kennedy. The primary objectives were to demonstrate crew, space vehicle and mission support facilities performance during a manned Saturn V mission with the command-service module and the lunar module ; demonstrate LM/crew performance; demonstrate docking, intervehicular crew transfer, extravehicular capability and LM-active rendezvous and docking; and conduct CSM/LM consumables assessment. -
Apollo 1
During a preflight test at the launch pad in Cape Kennedy Astronauts Virgil Grissom, Edward White and Roger Chaffee lost their lives when a fire swept through the command module. The mission was to be the first crewed flight of Apollo, and was scheduled to launch Feb. 21, 1967. -
Apollo 7
Apollo 7 was the first manned test of the Command and Service Module. The crew orbited the Earth 163 times and spent 10 days and 20 hours in space. -
Apollo 8
Apollo 8 was the first mission to take humans to the Moon and back. An important prelude to actually landing on the Moon was testing the flight trajectory and operations for getting there and back. Apollo 8 did this and acheived many other firsts including the first manned mission launched on the Saturn V, first manned launch from NASA's new Moonport, first pictures taken by humans of the Earth from deep space, and first live TV coverage of the lunar surface. -
Apollo 10
The Apollo 10 mission was a complete staging of the Apollo 11 mission without actually landing on the Moon. The mission was the second to orbit the Moon and the first to travel to the Moon with the entire Apollo spacecraft configuration. Astronauts Thomas Stafford and Eugene Cernan decended inside the Lunar Module to within 14 kilometers of the lunar surface achieving the closest approach to the Moon before Apollo 11 landed two months later. -
Apollo 11
Apollo 11 was the first manned mission to land on the Moon. The first steps by humans on another planetary body were taken by Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on July 20, 1969. The astronauts also returned to Earth the first samples from another planetary body. Apollo 11 achieved its primary mission - to perform a manned lunar landing and return the mission safely to Earth - and paved the way for the Apollo lunar landing missions to follow. -
Apollo 12
The Apollo 12 mission was the second manned lunar landing mission. Its objective was to perform detailed scientific lunar exploration. The space vehicle with a crew of Charles (Pete) Conrad, Jr., the commander; Richard F. Gordon, the command module pilot; and Alan L. Bean. -
Apollo 13
Apollo 13 was to be the third mission to land on the Moon. An explosion in one of the oxygen tanks crippled the spacecraft during flight and the crew were forced to orbit the Moon and return to the Earth without landing.The Apollo 13 Mission was planned as a lunar landing mission but was aborted en route to the moon after about 56 hours of flight due to loss of service module cryogenic oxygen and consequent loss of capability to generate electrical power, to provide oxygen and to produce water. -
Apollo 14
Apollo 14 landed in the Fra Mauro region, the intended landing site of the aborted Apollo 13 mission. The astronauts used the Modularized Equipment Transporter (MET) to haul equipment during two EVAs (later missions would use the Lunar Roving Vehicle). They collected samples, took photographs, and the nearby Cone crater. One of the more famous moments came at the end of the second EVA when Apollo 14 commander Alan Shepard hit 2 golf balls on the Moon. -
Apollo 15
Apollo 15 was the fourth mission to land men on the Moon. This mission was the first flight of the Lunar Roving Vehicle which astronauts used to explore the geology of the Hadley Rille/Apennine region. The LRV allowed Apollo 15, 16 and 17 astronauts to venture further from the Lunar Module than in previous missions. -
Apollo 16
Apollo 16 was the fifth mission to land men on the moon and return them to Earth. It was also the second flight of the Lunar Roving Vehicle. Apollo 16 landed in a highlands area, a region not yet explored on the Moon. Astronauts collected samples, took photographs and conducted experiments that included the first use of an ultraviolet camera/spectrograph on the Moon. -
Apollo 17
Apollo 17 was the last Apollo mission to land men on the Moon. It carried the only trained geologist to walk on the lunar surface, lunar module pilot Harrison Schmitt. Compared to previous Apollo missions, Apollo 17 astronauts traversed the greatest distance using the Lunar Roving Vehicle and returned the greatest amount of rock and soil samples. Eugene Cernan, commander of Apollo 17, still holds the distinction of being the last man to walk on the Moon, as no humans have visited the Moon since
