Apollo to the Moon!
Published on May 20, 2006 at 11:48 am.
2 Comments.
Filed under moon, space exploration.
So, how many men have been to the Moon? I get asked this question now and then. Hmm. You’d think that it’d be a simple answer. Like so many things, though, it depends upon how you define your terms. What do you mean “to the Moon”?
Well, you might say that “to the Moon” means landing on the Moon. In that case, the answer is simple. 12 men have been to the Moon. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed in the Sea of Tranquility July 20, 1969, with the Apollo 11 mission. In Apollo 12, Pete Conrad and Alan Bean landed near the unmanned Surveyor 3 craft in the Ocean of Storms on November 19, 1969. Alan Shepard and Edgar Mitchell of Apollo 14 landed in the Fra Mauro region on February 5, 1971. On July 26, 1971, David Scott and James Irwin of Apollo 15 landed near Hadley Rille in the Sea of Rain. Apollo 16 saw John Young and Charles Duke land in the lunar highlands near the Descartes Crater on April 21, 1972. And, the last two men to land on the Moon, Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt, landed at the Taurus-Littrow valley on December 11, 1972.
Oh, but you might define “going to the Moon” a bit differently. For example, Apollo 8 was the first manned mission to the Moon, with Frank Borman, Bill Anders, and Jim Lovell, arriving December 24, 1968. However, Apollo 8 did not carry a Lunar Module, so no landing was possible. Instead, the Command Module just circled the Moon, and came back to Earth. However, doesn’t that count as going to the Moon? Apollo 10 also flew to the Moon without landing. Apollo 13 was supposed to land near Fra Mauro, but an exploding oxygen tank aborted the landing portion of the mission, and the spacecraft simply looped around the Moon and came back to Earth. Each of the missions that landing on the Moon had a third astronaut who remained onboard the Command Module orbiting the Moon while the other two astronauts landed. Hmm. That makes for nine missions to the Moon. Each carried three astronauts, so there were 27 men sent to the Moon, right? Well, sort of. You see, some of those astronauts went more than once. So, if you are asking how many individuals went to the Moon, then 27 is double counting, so we need to go back and not count those that went more than once. Eugene Cernan flew on Apollo 10 around the Moon, and landed with Apollo 17. Likewise, John Young also flew around the Moon with Apollo 10, and he landed on the Moon with Apollo 16. Lovell, flew around the Moon on both Apollo 8 and Apollo 13. These three men flew twice, so that means that only 24 different individuals flew to the Moon.
So, that’s your little bit of Apollo trivia for the day.
-Astroprof
Garland O'Quinn on January 24, 2007 at 3:07 pm: 1
Many thanks for summing this for the rest of us. Now my question is the unique perspective that these 24 men have had. To view the earth from outer space must have given these men some perspective that the rest of us do not have. Can you direct me to any research that has attempted to examine their words, comments, and writing to discover some change in their point of view about this planet and the human specie that lives here. Many thanks, Garland O’Quinn, Jr. email address is goquinn@utep.edu
Astroprof on January 24, 2007 at 5:14 pm: 2
I don’t know of any place where all that has been put together in a single reference. However, I do know that a number of astronauts have written about their experiences. You can do a literature search on each of the men who went to the Moon and see what they have written. Several wrote books, so you can even search Amazon.com (there’s a search box here on my page in the left column!).