This 12 minute video of the live space travel by Apollo II in 1969….highlighted by a space walk and lunar landing for the first two men ever, Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong….which makes this an absolute treasure in our vintage video library here at ImaSportsphile.
Apollo 11 was the spaceflight that landed the first two humans on the Moon….as mission commander Neil Armstrong and pilot Buzz Aldrin, both American, landed the lunar module Eagle on July 20, 1969, at 20:18 UTC….Armstrong became the first to step onto the lunar surface six hours after landing on July 21 at 02:56:15 UTC….then Aldrin joined him about 20 minutes later. They spent about two and a quarter hours together outside the spacecraft….while collecting 47.5 pounds (21.5 kg) of lunar material to bring back to Earth….as USA astronaut Michael Collins piloted the command module Columbia alone in lunar orbit….while they were on the Moon’s surface….as Armstrong and Aldrin spent just under a day on the lunar surface before rejoining Columbia in lunar orbit.
Apollo 11 was launched by a Saturn V rocket from Kennedy Space Center in Merritt Island, Florida, on July 16 at 9:32 am EDT (13:32 UTC)….as the 5th manned mission of NASA’s Apollo program. The Apollo spacecraft had three parts….with a command module (CM) with a cabin for the three astronauts…. along with the only part that landed back on Earth….which was a service module (SM) that supported the command module with propulsion, electrical power, oxygen, and water….while the 3rd part was a lunar module (LM) that had two stages with a lower stage for landing on the Moon….and an upper stage to place the astronauts back into lunar orbit.
After being sent toward the Moon by the Saturn V’s upper stage….the astronauts separated the spacecraft from it and traveled for three days until they entered into lunar orbit….when Armstrong and Aldrin moved into the lunar module Eagle and landed in the Sea of Tranquility on the Moon’s surface….then they used Eagle’s upper stage to lift off from the lunar surface and rejoin Collins in the command module. They jettisoned Eagle before they performed the maneuvers that blasted them out of lunar orbit on a trajectory back to Earth….and returned to Earth and landed in the Pacific Ocean on July 24th, 1969.
The lunar landing was broadcast on live TV to a worldwide audience….as Armstrong stepped onto the lunar surface and described the event as “one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind.” ….as Apollo 11 effectively ended the Space Race….and thus fulfilling a national goal proposed in 1961 by U.S. President John F. Kennedy….when he stated “before this decade is out…the USA will be landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth.”
This video provides an absolutely rare capsule of space history in such a riveting and fascinating way….and not a word is spoken….for nothing scripted could ever tell the story of the landing on the Moon better than this video. ENJOY!!!
