Page 113 - The Appollo Story

.------------t The Apollo Story

Apollo 17 (AS-512) The Last Man On The Moon
Apollo 17 had been the longest lunar mission, spending the most time on the moon. In total the six Apollo
landings returned around 850lb (385kg) of lunar rock, thousands of photographs and a mountain of data
on the surface and from lunar orbit. However, they came back with more than just rocks; perhaps
Apollo's most enduring icon remains a single photograph taken by Ron Evans. Known as the 'blue mar-
ble' photo. It shows Earth as seen from space (postcard below). They had gone to explore the Moon, but
what they discovered was the importance, the beauty and the fragility of our home planet.

For the first time on an Apollo mission, the Antarctic ice cap
was visible during the Apollo 17 translunar coast. This full-
disk view encompasses much of the South Atlantic Ocean,
virtually all the Indian Ocean, Antarctica, Africa, a part of
Asia, and, on the horizon, Indonesia and the western edge of
Australia.