Apollo 10 - part 2

Meet the Crew

Gene Cernan : John Young : Tom Stafford

Gene Cernan, whilst paving the way for the first man on the moon, was eventually to be the last man on the Moon.

John Young had flown Gemini, and went on to fly the Apollo Command Module, Apollo Lunar Module and the Space Shuttle. He also drove the Lunar Rover on the Moon.

Tom Stafford flew Gemini, Apollo and the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project.


This was the first manned space mission to contain an all-veteran crew - the mission was very challenging and therefore proven, experienced crewmembers were selected to carry it out. This was essentially a dress rehearsal for a Moon landing, and was required to bring Stafford and Cernan's lunar module "Snoopy" to only 8.4 nautical miles (15.6 km) above the lunar surface.

Except for the final descent from 8.4 miles down to the surface, the landing and later Lunar liftoff, the mission was designed to simulate exactly the landing approach, and later Lunar orbit rendezvous after lift-off with the Command Module ("Charlie Brown").

For Mission Control in Houston and Apollo's extensive tracking and control network around the world this crucial, but nonetheless challenging test was intended to form a dry run for a Moon landing mission.

But remember - none of this was routine. Little of it had been done before.

And none of it had been done whilst circling the Moon, a quarter of a million miles away...