From the time Yuri Gagarin was launched into orbit on Vostok around the Earth by Space Agency and Russian Aviation on 21st April, 1961, humans have been venturing into various space missions. NASA has launched at least 182, Russia has launched 105, china has launched 3 and Scaled Composites, a private company has launched another 3 manned spacecrafts in the last 47 years.
Most of these 283 missions, however, did nothing more than go around orbiting. Manned missions that have actually ventured close to another celestial body’s influence of gravitation numbers only nine.
The first mission saw Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and William Anders putting into lunar orbit their command module called Apollo, almost forty years ago. The year 1968, was in fact a tumultuous year for America. This year saw a lot of casualties in Vietnam’s Tet offensive, assassination in Memphis of Martin Luther King followed by riots, assassination of Robert Kennedy, etc. This incident filled year also saw something productive happening with the launching of three humans into the moon voyage on Apollo 8. This historic event took pace on December 21st.
The crew orbited around the moon aboard Apollo 8 on the eve of Christmas. Their Christmas treat was the first ever view of the dark side of the moon. They were also the first to see Earth rise.
A live broadcast was provided on television of the crew’s ninth lunar orbit by NASA. The splash down on Pacific Ocean saw the successful end of the mission, where USS Yorktown, the aircraft carrier picked up the victorious crew.
