Description
Apollo 8, the second manned mission in the United States Apollo space program, was launched on December 21, 1968 and became the first manned space craft to leave Earth orbit, reach the Earth's Moon, orbit it and return safely to Earth. The three-astronaut crew — Commander Frank Borman, Command Module Pilot James Lovell, and Lunar Module Pilot William Anders — became the first humans to travel beyond low Earth orbit, the first to see Earth as a whole planet, and then the first to directly see the far side of the Moon. The 1968 mission, the third flight of the Saturn V rocket and the first manned launch of the Saturn V, was also the first manned launch from the John F. Kennedy Space Center, Florida, located adjacent to Cape Canaveral.
Originally planned as a second Lunar Module/Command Module test in an elliptical medium Earth orbit in early 1969, the mission profile was changed in August 1968 to a more ambitious Command Module-only lunar orbital flight to be flown in December, becau...
