Such a day as today: The man came to the moon in 1969

On July 20, 1969, the commander of the Apollo 11 mission, Neil Armstrong, was the first man to set foot on the moon. That day, a dream of humanity became reality and 600 million viewers of the world heard his first words: "It's a small step for the man, a big step for the # 39; humanity. "

The arrival on the moon has proved to be the most expensive space program of the US government. A quarter-mile race against the Soviet Union and the only occasion where the man came out of the planet Earth.

On July 16, astronauts Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin took off from Cape Kennedy. , Florida, aboard the Apollo 11 ship on the Saturn V rocket. The trip to the moon did not present any difficulty. Everything went well.

On Sunday, July 20, already on the lunar orbit and after traveling 380,000 kilometers, Aldrin and Armstrong moved to the landing module on the moon "Aguila". While Michael Collins remained flying the "Columbia" control unit, waiting for the separation of the capsule and supporting lunar module maneuvers.

At 10h56. July 20 (US Atlantic Time – 3:56 am July 21, Spanish Peninsular Time), Armstrong climbed down a ladder with his spacesuit and put his left foot on the moon.

The words were "I am at the foot of the ladder." The legs of the Eagle have only lowered the surface by a few centimeters.The surface seems to be a very fine grain, seen from close up.C & # 39, is almost a fine powder, very thin.Now I leave the platform. "

Then I would say the historical phrase:" It's a small step for the man; a jump gigantic for Humanity. "

Aldrin followed 19 minutes later and after meeting Armstrong, he exclaimed" What a magnificent desolation! ". The ship had landed in the area called "The Sea of ​​Tranquility", a vast expanse of fine sand and rock.

Shortly after, the two astronauts nailed an American flag to the ground and spoke on the radio with the president. Richard M. Nixon at the White House

Both walked more than two hours on the moon. They collected more than 20 kilograms of soil samples, took photographs and placed an artifact to detect and measure the solar wind, a laser reflector and a seismograph.

While the astronauts were on the surface, Michael Collins orbited the "Columbia" at a distance of 111 kilometers.

The return of Apollo 11 was smoothly carried out and on July 24, 1969, 8 days after the beginning of the mission, the ship fell on the waters of the Pacific Ocean, close to the sea. Hawaii, where the aircraft carrier Hornet was waiting to pick them up.

The exploit, considered one of the most important moments of humanity, beside the fire or the invention of the years of preparation to successfully conduct, of the work of 350 thousand people and 24 million dollars.

Chronology of the most important missions on the Moon:

– 2 January 1959 (USSR) .- The Luna-1 spacecraft is the first spacecraft bound for the moon. Determines that the Moon does not have a magnetic field

– October 4, 1959 (USSR). – The Luna-3 probe sends the first photographs of the hidden side of the Moon.

– July 31, 1964 (USA) .- The Ranger-7 probe is the first American to reach the Moon.

– February 3, 1966 (USSR) . – The ship Luna-9 makes the first controlled descent on the Moon and sends photographs of its surface.

– October 26, 1968 (USSR). – The Soyuz-3, with astronaut Georgi T. Beregovoi with 60 laps on the Moon

– December 24, 1968 (USA). – Three astronauts aboard Apollo VIII make ten turns on the moon.

– July 20, 1969 (United States) .- The Apollo-11 piloted by Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Edwin Aldrin perches on the lunar surface. Armstrong was the first man to set foot on the Moon

– Thursday, November 10, 1970 (USSR) .- The Luna-17 probe deploys a self-scanning vehicle on the lunar surface, which transmits during days to Earth, scientific images and data from the Moon.

– December 11, 1972 (USA) .- The last American expedition made up of astronauts Eugene Cernan, Ronald Evans and Harrison Schmitt

– 1974 .- L'l '. Soviet Union leaves the inhabited lunar program

– August 1976 (USSR). – The Soviet Union ends with the Moon -24 series of unmanned missions on the Moon.

– January 24, 1990 (Japan). – Japan becomes the third country to send a ship – "Hiten" – to the Luna.

– January 25, 1994 (USA ) .- Since the last Apollo 1972 mission, the American ship Clementine, of civilian and military utility, returns to the Moon and sends photographs [19659002] – January 7, 1998 (USA) .- The American Luna Prosper sends photographs of the composition of The Moon

– September 27, 2003 (EU). – The European Union, through the European Space Agency (ESA), sends the Smart-1 probe to the moon. [19659002] – October 4, 2007 .- Japan launches the Kaguya probe on the Moon with the mission to collect information on the magnetic fields of the satellite.

– October 24, 2007 .- China sends the Chang E I probe. The first Chinese lunar mission, which ends on March 3, 2009, after striking the ship against the surface of the Moon.

– October 22, 2008. .- India sends the Chandrayaan-1 probe to the moon, whose radio contact was lost in August 2009. [19659002] – June 18, 2009. – First American step towards the Moon. NASA's Atlas V rocket leaves the Moon with the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) capsules and the Lunar Crater Observing Satellite (LCROSS), to study the conditions of human settlement on the satellite of the Moon. Earth. On October 9, 2009, the LCROSS spacecraft and its Centaur rocket successfully completed the mission by impacting the bottom of a lunar crater. First, it struck the empty rocket, causing a column of dust that rose more than six kilometers above the crater. Later, he hit the probe that crossed the dust trail from which he gathered information before crashing.

With preliminary data obtained, on November 13, 2009, NASA announced the discovery of water on the moon. – September 10, 2011. – Two probes from NASA's GRAIL (Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory) mission leave for the Moon to measure the magnetic field of the Earth's satellite and provide images in X-rays of its cortex and nucleus. (Source: larazon.es)