A German Lunar X-Prize team has announced its intentions to send two mobile probes to the Moon to inspect the lunar rover left behind by the Apollo 17 mission. Finally, something that’ll get the Moon landing conspiracy nutters to shut the hell up.
On December 14, 1972, astronaut Eugene Cernan stepped up onto the lunar module, shook the moon dust off these boots, and ended an era of human exploration of the Moon.
On December 11, 1972, Apollo 17 touched down on the Moon. This was not only our final Moon landing, but the last time we left low Earth orbit. With the successful launch of the Orion capsule, NASA is finally poised to go further again. So it’s important to remember how we got to the Moon — and why we stopped going.
Earlier this week, NASA uploaded an incredible treasure trove of images to a new gallery on Flickr: unprocessed photographs from all of the manned Apollo missions. They represent an incredible look into what the astronauts saw on their missions to the moon.
In 1972, a number of notable SF authors and scientists boarded the S.S. Statendam for a unique experience: witness the night launch of Apollo 17.
December 14, 1972: Admire a fleeting moment of scientific poetry: sunlight reflecting off a dusty ball of rock, the moonlight in turn reflecting off a fragile craft in the harshness of space.
This is one car that you can leave unlocked when you walk away from it. According to Astronomy Picture of the Day, “This sharp image was taken by Cernan as he and Schmitt roamed the valley floor. The image shows Schmitt on the left with the lunar rover at the edge of Shorty Crater, near the spot where geologist…
If you are fond of the Apollo project, then you'll love this site Ben Feist has been building for years—which is now online in its very early alpha stage. Apollo17.org is a highly addictive, interactive, real-time exploration of the entire Apollo 17 Mission, based upon official NASA footage and the transcription of…
When Apollo 17 lifted off from the moon 42 years ago this week, a camera captured the movements of the spacecraft — even though nobody was left behind to, say, establish a lunar base. How was that possible?
Yesterday's 263-foot drive by the NASA's Opportunity put Mars Rover's total distance driven at 35.76 km, breaking the 40-year-old record for the greatest distance driven by a NASA vehicle on another celestial body. But Opportunity still hasn't quite beaten the record set by the USSR's Lunokhod 2.
Here's a freshly-updated infographic by SPACE.com's Karl Tate, illustrating the distances driven by various rovers on the Moon and Mars.
Contrary to the cries of conspiracy theorists, there was once a time when man traveled to the moon, and on this day in 1972, we made one last splashdown in the Pacific Ocean before cutting ties. Since then, mankind hasn't traveled more than 400 miles above the Earth's surface (the moon lies almost 240,000 miles above).
Everyone knows the first words that were said on the moon, but what about the last? 40 years ago yesterday we left the moon for the last time, so now's as good a time as any to ask. The answer? Well there are a few, and you can pick which one you like better.
Let's say you're an astronaut. You're on the Moon. You're hundreds of thousands of miles away from home, and the only thing between you and near-vacuum conditions is a cumbersome space-suit that affords about as much maneuverability as a body cast. What do you do?
Scientists examining Hubble Telescope images of the Moon recently noticed what looked like titanium deposits all around the 1972 Apollo 17 landing site. When they inspected samples of moon rock from the site that were brought back to Earth by the Apollo team, scientists discovered that they were, in fact, chock full…
This lunar soil marks the last time humans visited another world. It was here in December 1972 that the final Apollo astronauts walked on the Moon. This image is a solemn reminder of our space explorations past and (hopefully) future.
When I looked at this photo my first thought was "Oh, what a cute paper model of the lunar module! It's so nicely done!" Then I read that this was not a model, but a photo of the real thing.
It's blurrier than old MySpace snapshots, but it's there as expected. The Apollo Lunar Modules and the US flag left behind at the Apollo 17 landing site has been caught in a close-up image by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter.
