Apollo 12 Goes Back to the Moon

Beyond Apollo 11

Apollo 12, the second manned mission to land on the Moon, was planned and executed as a precision landing. The astronauts landed the Lunar Module within walking distance of the Surveyor III spacecraft which had landed on the Moon in April of 1967. The astronauts brought instruments from Surveyor III back to Earth to examine the effects of long-term exposure to the lunar environment.

Mission Objectives

Primary objectives included:

1. Perform inspection, survey and sampling in lunar mare area
2. Deploy an Apollo Lunar Surface Experiment Package (ALSEP).
3. Develop techniques for a point landing capability
4. Develop capability to work in the lunar environment
5. Obtain photographs of candidate exploration sites

Secondary objective was to the retrieve portions of the Surveyor III spacecraft which had been exposed to the lunar environment since the unmanned spacecraft soft-landed on the inner slope of a crater on April 20, 1967.