October 29, 1966....Lunar Orbiter 1s orbit decays and crashes on the Moon. LO1 was launched in August 1966 and was the first American spacecraft to orbit the Moon. Its primary purpose was to photograph potential landing sites for the Surveyor & Apollo missions. LO1 also transmitted the first picture of the Earth from the Moon. The early end of the planned 1 year mission was due to the spacecrafts deterioration, limited amount of attitude control fuel remaining, and to prevent transmission interference when Lunar Orbiter 2 arrived. LO1 completed 75% of its mission when it was commanded to crash into the Moons far side.
Posted on: Wed, 29 Oct 2014 18:15:50 +0000
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