Moon landing facts for kids

Map shows landing sites of Surveyor, Apollo and Luna missions

A Moon landing is the arrival of a spacecraft on the surface of the Moon. This includes both manned and unmanned (robotic) missions. The first man-made object to reach the surface of the Moon was the Soviet Union's Luna 2 mission, on 13 September 1959.

The United States' Apollo 11 was the first manned mission to land on the Moon, on 20 July 1969. There have been six manned U.S. landings (between 1969 and 1972) and numerous unmanned landings, with no soft landings happening from 22 August 1976 until 14 December 2013.

To date, the United States is the only country to have successfully flown manned missions to the Moon. The last mission was in in December, 1972.

Apollo 11

Buzz Aldrin as photographed by Neil Armstrong on the moons surface.

Apollo 11 was the first flight to send people to the moon. It was done by NASA, the American space group. It went up to space on 16 July 1969, carrying three astronauts: Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins. On 20 July 1969, Armstrong and Aldrin became the first humans to land on the moon, while Collins stayed in orbit around the Moon.

The flight was part of the Space Race. It finished the plan set by John F. Kennedy in 1961 to "land a man on the moon, and return him safely to the Earth", before the 1960s ended.

Related pages

• Apollo Program
• Apollo 11
• Moon

Images for kids

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  Still frame from a video transmission, taken moments before Neil Armstrong became the first human to step onto the surface of the Moon, at 02:56 UTC on 21 July 1969. An estimated 500 million people worldwide watched this event, the largest television audience for a live broadcast at that time.

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  Stamp with a drawing of the first soft landed probe Luna 9, next to the first view of the lunar surface photographed by the probe.

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  The view through the window of the Lunar Module Orion shortly after Apollo 16's landing.

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  Artist's portrayal of a Ranger spacecraft right before impact

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  One of the last photos of the Moon transmitted by Ranger 8 right before impact

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  Model of Luna 16 Moon soil sample return lander

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  Model of Soviet Lunokhod automatic Moon rover

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  Launch of Surveyor 1.

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  Pete Conrad, commander of Apollo 12, stands next to Surveyor 3 lander. In the background is the Apollo 12 lander, Intrepid.

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  A timeline of the space race between 1957 and 1975, with missions from the US and USSR.

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  The U.S. Saturn V and the Soviet N1.

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  Apollo landing sites

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  Astronaut Buzz Aldrin, Lunar Module pilot of the first lunar landing mission, poses for a photograph beside the deployed United States flag during an Apollo 11 Extravehicular Activity (EVA) on the lunar surface.

See also

In Spanish: Alunizaje para niños