International Flight nº: 33 |
Earth orbit Flight nº: 31 |
USA launch Flight nº: 21 |
Lunar flight nº: 3 |
Lunar orbit nº: 3 |
Lunar landing nº: 1 |
First manned lunar landing
Launch, orbit & landing data:
| Designation | 04039 / 69059A |
| Launch date - time | 16 Jul 1969 - 13:32:00 UT |
| Launch site | KSC, LC39A |
| Launch vehicle |
Saturn V (SA-506) |
| Payload | Apollo CSM 107 |
| Size (m) | 11.15 long - 3.91 dia |
| Mass at launch(kg) | 43909 (CM/SM/LM) |
| Mass empty (kg) | 12050 |
| Flight Crew | Armstrong, Neil (CDR)
Collins, Michael (CMP)
Aldrin, Edwin (LMP) |
| Call Sign | Columbia/Eagle |
| Backup crew | Anders, Haise, Lovell |
| Earth orbit on Jul 16 (14:24 UT): |
| - Perigee / Apogee | 183 x 184 km |
| - Inclination | 32.51° |
| - Period | 88.03 min |
| Orbital parameters on 16 Jul (19:12 UT): |
| - Perigee / Apogee | 174 / 533000 km |
| - Inclination | 33.3° |
| - Period | 24400 min |
| Selenocentric orbit on 19 Jul (17:31 UT): |
| Landing date - time | 24 Jul 1969 - 16:50:35 UT |
| Landing location | 13.0° N, 169.0° W
1600 km soutwest of Honululu in Pacific Ocean |
| Flight Duration (d:hr:min) | 8d 03h 18m 35s |
| Nbr Earth orbits | 1,5 |
| Nbr lunar orbits | |
|
|
Crew:
| Nr. |
Surname |
Given name |
Job |
Duration |
| 1 |
Armstrong |
Neil Alden |
CDR |
8d 03h 18m |
| 2 |
Collins |
Michael |
CMP |
8d 03h 18m |
| 3 |
Aldrin |
Edwin Eugene "Buzz" |
LMP |
8d 03h 18m |
EVA′s:
Date of
beginning |
Time (UT)
of
beginning |
Duration |
Explanation |
| Jul 21, 1969 |
02:39:33 |
2:31:40 |
EVA started (hatch opened); beginning of the 1st
walk on the Moon surface ( Armstrong and Aldrin); LM of spacecraft "Apollo-11" |
| Total: |
2h.31m. |
EVAs: 1
|
Flight:
Summary: First manned lunar landing on 20.07.1969 (Armstrong and Aldrin), Armstrong at 3 h 56 m 20s, a.m.
(UT) the first man stepping on the lunar surface, 2h 32m EVA on the lunar surface, Armstrong and Aldrin collected
lunar rocks and other material (20 kg) and they build a scientific station (ALSEP). Landing area: Sea of Tranquility,
total lunar surface stay time: 21,5 h; succesfully docking of LM Eagle with CSM Columbia (with Collins on board).
 |
Saturn V 1 - Credit: NASA. |
Official NASA Account of the Mission from Where No Man Has Gone Before: A History of Apollo Lunar Exploration Missions, by
W. David Compton, published as NASA SP-4214 in the NASA History Series, 1989.
At 9:32 a.m. Eastern daylight time on July 16, 1969, Apollo 11 left Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy Space Center, bound for the moon. Four days later, at 4:18 p.m. EDT on July 20, Neil Armstrong skilfully set the lunar module Eagle down in the Sea of Tranquility and reported, "Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed." For the next 10 minutes Armstrong and Aldrin were occupied with several post-landing procedures, reconfiguring switches and systems. Armstrong found time to report to Mission Control what he had been too busy to tell them during the landing: that he had manually flown the lunar module over the rockstrewn crater where the automatic landing system was taking it. Then he made his first quick-look science report:
 |
Apollo 11 - Liftoff of the Apollo 11 lunar landing mission - Credit: NASA. |
"We'll get to the details of what's around here, but it looks like a collection of just about every variety of shape, angularity, granularity, about every variety of rock you could find. . . . There doesn't appear to be too much of a general color at all. However, it looks as though some of the rocks and boulders, of which there are quite a few in the near area, it looks as though they're going to have some interesting colors to them. . . . "
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Liftoff of the Apollo 11 lunar landing mission - Credit: NASA. |
After giving Houston as many clues as he could to the location of their module, he added some more description:
"The area out the left-hand window is a relatively level plain cratered with a fairly large number of craters of the 5- to 50-foot variety, and some ridges - small, 20, 30 feet high, I would guess, and literally thousands of little 1- and 2-foot craters around the area. We see some angular blocks out several hundred feet in front of us that are probably 2 feet in size and have angular edges. There is a hill in view, just about on the ground track ahead of us. Difficult to estimate, but might be half a mile or a mile. "
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Liftoff of the Apollo 11 lunar landing mission - Credit: NASA. |
Armstrong and Aldrin then started preparing their spacecraft for takeoff, setting up critical systems to be ready in case something happened and they had to leave the lunar surface quickly. A short break in this activity gave Armstrong a chance to pass along more information about the landing site:
". . . The local surface is very comparable to that we observed from orbit at this sun angle, about 10 degrees sun angle, or that nature. It's pretty much without color. It's . . . a very white, chalky gray, as you look into the zero-phase line [directly toward the sun]; and it's considerably darker gray, more like . . . ashen gray as you look out 90 degrees to the sun. Some of the surface rocks in close here that have been fractured or disturbed by the rocket engine plume are coated with this light gray on the outside; but where they've been broken, they display a dark, very dark gray interior; and it looks like it could be country basalt. "
 |
View of Earth showing clouds over water taken by Apollo 11 crewmembers - Credit: NASA. |
Setting up the spacecraft systems took another hour and a half to complete; then they were ready to get out and explore. The flight plan called for them to eat and then rest for four hours, but Aldrin called Mission Control to recommend starting their surface exploration in about three hours' time. Houston concurred. Although they had been awake almost 11 hours and had gone through some stressful moments during the landing, it seemed too much to expect the first men on the moon to take a nap before they made history.
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View of Earth rising over Moon's horizon taken from Apollo 11 spacecraft - Credit: NASA. |
While Armstrong and Aldrin tended to their postlanding chores, Mike Collins, orbiting 60 nautical miles (112 kilometers) overhead in the command module Columbia, had little to do. Houston enlisted his aid in an attempt to locate Eagle, giving him the best map coordinates they could derive from the sketchy information available. With his navigational sextant Collins scanned several spots, without success; Columbia passed over the landing site too rapidly to allow him to search the area thoroughly and he never found the lunar module. Determination of its exact location had to wait for postmission analysis of Armstrong's descriptions of the area and examination of the spacecraft's landing trajectory.
 |
View of Earth rising over Moon's horizon taken from Apollo 11 spacecraft - Credit: NASA. |
Getting ready to leave the lunar module took longer than the crew had anticipated. It was after 9:30 p.m. in Houston, an hour and a half later than they had hoped, when they opened the hatch. Armstrong carefully worked his way out onto the "porch," then climbed down the ladder, pausing on the lowest rung to comment on the texture of the surface and the depth to which the footpads had penetrated. At 9:56 p.m. he stepped onto the moon's surface, proclaiming, "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind" - inadvertently omitting an "a" before "man" and slightly changing the meaning he intended to convey.
 Apollo 11 Lunar Module Eagle, in a landing configuration was photographed in lunar orbit from the Command and Service Module |
|
Armstrong made a cursory inspection of the lunar module and reported his reactions to the new environment. Aldrin then lowered a camera on the lunar equipment carrier - a clothesline and pulley arrangement that seemed out of place in the high-technology environment of Apollo - which Armstrong immediately began using. Mission Control reminded him to scoop up the contingency sample, which he did. "I'll try to get a rock in here. Just a couple." He noted that the collecting tool met resistance after penetrating a short distance into the surface material. He then stowed the sample in a bag that he tucked into a pocket of his suit. To the scientists on earth he remarked, "Be advised that a lot of the rock samples out here, the hard rock samples, have what appear to be vesicles in the surface. Also, I am looking at one now that appears to have some sort of phenocryst."
 |
Astronaut Edwin Aldrin egresses lunar module on lunar surface - Credit: NASA. |
Aldrin then joined Armstrong on the surface, and they spent the next several minutes inspecting the landing craft and reporting on its condition, adjusting to the low lunar gravity and trying various ways of getting around on the surface. After a brief commemorative ceremony (reading the plaque attached to the lunar module) and a short conversation with President Richard Nixon, they began unloading and emplacing the scientific instruments and collecting samples. They supplemented earth's limited television view of their activities with descriptions of what they were seeing and doing. On a couple of occasions they acted like field geologists. Aldrin reported that he saw a rock that sparkled "like some kind of biotite," but he "would leave that to further analysis." After closely examining some rounded boulders near the spacecraft, Armstrong said they looked "like basalt, and they have probably two percent white minerals in them. . . . And the thing that I reported as vesicular before, I don't believe that any more. . . . they look like little impact craters where BB shot has hit the surface."
 Astronaut Edwin Aldrin descends steps of Lunar Module ladder to walk on moon |
 Astronaut Edwin Aldrin poses for photograph beside deployed U.S. flag |
Credit: NASA.
The geologists in Houston watching this surface activity on television were quite pleased with the astronauts' performance. At one
point Armstrong disappeared from the field of view of the TV camera, causing some momentary anxiety at his apparent departure from the
plan. It turned out that some unusual rocks had attracted his attention and he had gone off a few meters to collect them. That was
exactly the kind of thing the geologists had hoped people on the moon would do. By the time the crew had taken two core samples, again
experiencing difficulty in driving a sampling tool into the surface, and filled their sample return containers, Houston notified them
that it was time to wind up their activity. Just before midnight CapCom Bruce McCandless told Aldrin to "head on up the ladder,"
and at 12:11 a.m. Houston time both men and their samples were back in the lunar module and the hatch was sealed. Humanity's first
excursion on the surface of another celestial body had lasted 2 hours, 31 minutes, and 40 seconds.
 Aldrin on the Moon |
 Photograph of the Lunar Module at Tranquility Base was taken by Neil Armstrong during the Apollo 11
mission, from the rim of Little West Crater on the lunar surface. Armstrong′s shadow and the shadow of the camera are visible in the foreground. Credit: NASA |
Back inside the lunar module, Armstrong and Aldrin removed their lunar surface suits and portable life-support systems and used up
their remaining film. Houston passed up some more instructions in preparation for liftoff and tentatively signed off for the night,
but before long CapCom Owen Garriott, who had relieved McCandless, came on the line with some questions from the scientists about the
nature of the surface and the problems in driving sampling tools into the surface. Three hours after they returned to the lunar module,
the lunar explorers finally were able to turn in for a few hours of fitful sleep.
 Astronaut Edwin Aldrin walks on lunar surface near leg of Lunar Module |
 Astronaut Edwin Aldrin prepares to deploy EASEP on surface of moon |
Credit: NASA.
Next morning Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins spent most of their time setting up Eagle and Columbia for liftoff and rendezvous. Before the lunar module left the moon, however, Armstrong gave Mission Control a detailed description of the landing approach path and landing area, in the hope of helping scientists locate their exact landing spot, and summarized the characteristics of the soil and rocks around the area.
 The Earth emerges over the horizon as Neil and Buzz in the Eagle ascent stage rendezvous with Michael Collins in Columbia. (Photo:NASA) |
Liftoff and rendezvous went smoothly. When the two spacecraft were locked together Collins cracked Columbia's oxygen supply valve and Aldrin opened the lunar module's vent valve, to create a gas flow into the LM when the hatches were opened - part of the procedure to minimize back-contamination-while Aldrin and Armstrong vacuumed the lunar dust from their suits as best they could. Their vacuum cleaner, a brush attached to the exhaust hose of the LM suit system, was not very powerful and the tenacious dust came off only with difficulty. There was not nearly as much loose dust in the lunar module as they had expected when they returned from the surface; evidently it stuck tightly to whatever it touched. They passed the rock boxes and other items over to Collins and then clambered into the command module, where they removed their suits and stowed them in the bags provided. After jettisoning the lunar module and straightening up the command module, the three astronauts settled in for an uneventful trip back to earth.
In the early morning hours of July 24, 8 days, 3 hours, 18 minutes, and 18 seconds after leaving Kennedy Space Center, Columbia plopped down into the Pacific Ocean about 200 nautical miles (370 kilometers) south of Johnston Island. Recovery crews from the U.S.S. Hornet arrived quickly and tossed the biological isolation garments into the spacecraft. After the cocooned astronauts emerged from the spacecraft the swimmers swabbed the hatch down with Betadine (an organic iodine solution); then astronauts and recovery personnel decontaminated each other's protective garments with sodium hypochlorite solution. The biological isolation garments were not uncomfortable in the recovery raft, but aboard the helicopter they began accumulating heat. Both Collins and Armstrong felt that they were approaching the limit of their tolerance by the time they reached the ship. An hour after splashdown they were inside the mobile quarantine facility. As soon as they had changed into clean flight suits, the astronauts went to the large window at the rear end of the mobile quarantine facility to accept the nation's congratulations from President Nixon, who had flown out to the Hornet to meet them.
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Astronaut Edwin Aldrin after deployment of EASEP on surface of moon - Credit: NASA. |
Meanwhile, recovery crews brought Columbia on board and connected it to the astronauts' temporary home by
means of a plastic tunnel. Through this, the film magazines and sample return containers were taken into the quarantine trailer, then passed out through a decontamination lock. Sample return container no. 2, holding the documented sample, was packed in a shipping container along with film magazines and tape recorders and flown to Johnston Island, where it was immediately loaded aboard a C-141 aircraft and dispatched to Ellington Air Force Base near MSC. Six and a half hours later the other sample return container was flown to Hickam Air Force Base, Hawaii, and thence to Houston.
 Richard Gordon, center, with Charles Conrad, left, and Alan Bean, aboard the U.S.S. Hornet, after their spacecraft splashed down. Credit: NASA |
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Astronaut Edwin Aldrin deploying the EASEP on
surface of moon - Credit: NASA. |
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View of Astronaut Neil Armstrong in Lunar Module - Credit: NASA. |
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Interior view of Apollo 11 Lunar Module showing
displays and controls - Credit: NASA. |
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View of a full Moon photographed from Apollo 11 spacecraft - Credit: NASA. |
Apollo 11 Mission Events:
MET Date Time GMT Event
hhh mm ss 1969 hh mm ss
000 00 00 Jul 16 13 32 00 Clock running: mass 6,484,280 lb (2,941,250 kg)
000 00 00.3 13 32 00.3 First motion of Saturn 5: mass 6,398,535 lb
(2,902,356 kg)
000 02 15.2 13 34 15.2 S-IC stage central F-1 engine shutdown
000 02 41.63 13 34 41.63 S-IC stage outboard F-1 engines shutdown
000 02 42.30 13 34 42.30 S-IC stage separation command
000 02 44 13 34 44 S-II stage ignition of five J-2 engines
000 03 12.3 13 35 12.3 Separation of interstage: mass 1,454,014 lb (659,536 kg)
000 03 17.9 13 35 17.9 Separation of launch escape tower
000 07 40.62 13 39 40.62 S-II stage central J-2 engine shutdown
000 09 08.22 13 41 08.22 S-II stage outboard J-2 engines shutdown
000 09 09.00 13 41 09 S-II stage separation command
000 09 12.20 13 41 12.20 S—IVB stage J-2 engine ignition: mass 366,957 lb (166,451 kg)
000 11 39.33 13 43 39.33 S-IVB stage J-2 engine shutdown
000 11 49.33 13 43 49.33 Earth parking orbit injection:
32.52 deg, 100 nm (185 km) circular, mass 299,562 lb (135,880 kg)
002 44 16.2 Jul 16 16 16 16.2 S-IVB stage J-2 engine ignition: mass 296,379 lb (134,437 kg)
002 50 03.03 16 22 03.03 S-IVB stage J-2 engine shutdown
002 50 13.03 16 22 13.03 Trans-lunar injection complete: mass 139,369 lb
(63,217 kg): delta-V 9,965 ft/s (3,037 m/s)
003 15 23 16 47 23 Separation of CSM from S-IVB stack
003 24 03.7 16 56 03.7 CSM docks with LM and S-IVB
004 17 03 17 49 03 CSM/LM separate from S-IVB
026 44 58.64 Jul 17 16 16 58.64 Midcourse correction ignition
026 45 01.77 16 17 01.77 Midcourse correction shutdown
075 49 50.37 Jul 19 17 21 50.37 Selenocentric orbit injection ignition
075 55 47.90 17 27 47.90 Selenocentric orbit injection shutdown:
delta-V 2,424 ft/s (739 m/s), 178.75 deg, 60-170 nm (111-315 km)
080 11 36.75 21 43 36.75 Selenocentric orbit circularisation ignition
080 11 53.63 21 43 53.63 Selenocentric orbit circularisation shutdown:
delta-V 157.8 ft/s (48 m/s), 54-66 nm (100-122 km)
100 12 00 Jul 20 17 44 00 LM Eagle undocks from CSM Columbia
101 36 13 19 08 14 Eagle descent orbit insertion ignition
101 36 44 19 08 44 Eagle descent orbit insertion shutdown
delta-V 74.2 ft/s (23 m/s), 8-60 nm (15-111 km)
102 32 55 20 04 55 Eagle ~50,000 ft (15,240 metres) above the lunar surface
102 32 58 20 04 58 Eagle powered descent ignition
102 41 32 20 13 32 Eagle approach phase begins
102 45 39.9 20 17 39.9 Eagle lands on the Moon: 0.67408 deg N, 23.47297 deg E:
descent delta-V 6,761 ft/s (2,061 m/s)
102 45 41.40 20 17 41.40 Eagle powered descent engine shutdown
“Houston, Tranquillity Base here, the Eagle has landed” *
109 07 33 Jul 21 02 39 33 Eagle hatch opened
109 19 16 02 41 16 CDR Neil Armstrong completely outside Eagle
109 22 00 02 54 First clear television picture of Armstrong received
109 23 28 02 55 28 Armstrong at the foot of the Eagle ladder
109 24 15 02 56 15 Armstrong takes first step on the lunar surface
“That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” **
109 39 57 03 11 57 LMP Edwin Aldrin starts aggress from Eagle
109 43 16 03 15 16 Aldrin steps onto the Moon “Magnificent desolation”
109 52 19 03 24 19 Plaque on Eagle descent stage unveiled ***
110 55 42 04 27 42 Passive seismometer deployed
111 03 57 04 35 57 Lunar ranging retroreflector deployed
111 29 39 05 01 39 Aldrin back inside Eagle
111 37 32 05 09 32 Armstrong back inside Eagle
111 39 13 05 11 13 Eagle hatch closed: end of EVA activity
124 22 00.79 Jul 21 17 54 00.79 Eagle ascent stage engine ignition: launch from the Moon
124 29 15.67 18 01 15.67 Eagle ascent stage engine shutdown: selenocentric orbit:
delta-V 6,055 ft/s (1,846 m/s), 9-45 nm (17-83 km)
126 17 49.6 19 49 49 Eagle constant differential height ignition
126 18 29.2 19 50 29.2 Eagle constant differential height shutdown:
delta-V 49.4 ft/s (15 m/s), 44.2-45.5 nm (82-84 km)
127 03 51.8 20 35 51.8 Eagle terminal phase initiation ignition
127 04 14.5 20 36 14.5 Eagle terminal phase initiation shutdown:
delta-V 24.6 ft/s (7 m/s)
127 18 30.8 20 50 30.8 Eagle first midcourse correction
127 33 30.8 21 05 30.8 Eagle second midcourse correction
127 36 57.3 21 08 57.3 Eagle braking manoeuvre starts
127 46 09.8 21 18 09.8 Eagle terminal phase finalise ignition
127 46 38.2 21 18 38.2 Eagle terminal phase finalise shutdown
127 52 05.3 21 24 05.3 Eagle and Columbia begin station-keeping
128 03 00 21 35 00 Eagle and Columbia dock
130 09 31.2 23 41 31.2 Eagle ascent stage jettisoned from Columbia
135 23 42.28 Jul 22 04 55 42.28 Trans-Earth injection ignition
135 26 13.69 04 58 13.69 Trans-Earth injection shutdown:
delta-V 3,293 ft/s (1,004 m/s)
150 29 57.4 20 01 57.4 Midcourse correction ignition
150 30 07.4 20 02 07.4 Midcourse correction shutdown
194 49 12.7 Jul 24 16 21 12.7 CM/SM separation
195 03 05.7 16 35 05.7 Start of atmospheric re-entry
195 18 35 16 50 35 CM splashdown: 13.30 deg N, 169.15 deg W
* The first words after landing were Aldrin reading the post-landing checklist: “Engine stop, ACA out of detent, mode control both auto, descent engine command override off, engine arm off, 413 is in.”
** There is no evidence from any of the available tapes that the indefinite article was present before the word “man”.
*** “Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon, July 1969 AD. We came in peace for all mankind.”
NOTES:
1 - “MET” is “Mission Elapsed Time”.
2 - The original NASA material quotes numerical data in imperial units, and these are quoted below with the metric equivalents in parentheses: 2.2046 lb = 1 kg, 1 nm (nautical mile) = 1.852 km, 1ft = 0.3048 metres.
Apollo 11 Masses
Command/Service Module CSM-107 “Columbia”
Dry CM mass 12,204 lb (5,342 kg) [1]
CM RCS propellant 246 lb (112 kg) [2] unused 205 lb (93 kg) [2]
CM mass at launch 12,250 lb (5,454 kg) [3]
Dry SM 9,870 lb (4,048 kg) [1]
SM RCS propellant 560 lb (254 kg) [2] unused 780 lb (354 kg) [2]
SM SPS propellant 40,813 lb (18,513 kg) [2] unused 5,074 lb (2,302 kg) [2]
SM mass at launch 51,243 lb (22,815 kg) [3]
Combined CSM 63,493 lb (28.269 kg) [3]
Lunar Module LM-5 “Eagle”
Ascent stage, dry 4,804 lb (2,139 kg) [3]
RCS propellants 634 lb (288 kg) [2] unused 315 lb (143 kg) [2]
Ascent stage propellant 5,238 lb (2,376 kg) [2] unused 402 lb (182 kg) [2]
Total ascent stage 10,676 lb (4,843 kg) [1]
Descent stage, dry 4,483 lb (1,996 kg) [3]
Descent stage propellant 18,184 lb (8,248 kg) [2] unused 770 lb (349 kg) [2]
Total descent stage 22,667 lb (10,282 kg) [1]
Total lunar module 33,343 lb (15,124 kg) [1]
The numerical data are from different sources and the data which they give are inconsistent with each other: [1] – subtraction/addition using other data, [2] – Apollo 11 post-flight Mission Report and [3] = Apollo 11 pre-launch Press Kit.
External links:
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Ref.: #1, #2, #6, #7, #8, #16, #127, #225(09.06), #321 - update: 22.05.21
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