What Is the Apollo 11 Landing Site Like Now?
Editor’s Note: This article is part of a series reflecting on the Apollo 11 mission, 50 years later.
About 4.5 billion years ago, according to the most popular theory of the moon’s formation, a mysterious rocky world the size of Mars slammed into Earth. From the fiery impact, shards swirled and fused into a new, airless world, itself bombarded with rocky objects. In the absence of the smoothing touch of weather and tectonic activity, every dent remained. And then, one day, among craters both microscopic and miles-wide, two guys came along and stepped on the surface, carving new hollows with their boots.
Buzz Aldrin, seeing the moon from the surface for the first time, described it as “magnificent desolation.”
It was not so desolate when they departed. going back for these.)
