Pinpoint Landing, Great Science, and a Lot of Fun

Abstract

On April 20, 1967, more than 2 years before Apollo 11, the unmanned spacecraft Surveyor III landed in a crater on the plains of Oceanus Procellarum (Ocean of Storms). The craft had a stormy landing, bouncing twice because the descent rockets had not shut off. Unlike Surveyor II, which crashed into the lunar surface and was never heard from again, the robust Surveyor III had a short — but productive — life digging a trench, conducting soil mechanics tests, and sending more than 6,000 photographs back to Earth. The mission proved without a doubt that the lunar surface was firm and that the astronauts would not disappear into “quicksand,” thus clearing the way for the landing of the first Apollo lunar module.