Imagine driving a car where there are no roads and you weigh almost nothing. On April 20, 1972, the Apollo 16 lunar module landed on the Moon. Astronauts John Young and Charles Duke climbed out onto the surface. They had a special vehicle with them: the Lunar Roving Vehicle, or LRV. It was an electric car designed to work in the Moon's low gravity. The rover weighed about 460 pounds on Earth but only 77 pounds on the Moon. Duke later said that driving on the Moon felt like floating. The rover bounced over craters and kicked up clouds of gray dust. Without air, the dust did not drift slowly. It flew in perfect arcs and fell straight back down. Young and Duke spent three days exploring the surface. They drove the rover for over sixteen miles. They collected more than two hundred pounds of Moon rocks. Scientists studied these rocks for clues about how the Moon formed. Apollo 16 was the second-to-last mission to land people on the Moon. Only one more followed before the program ended. No human has returned since December 1972. The LRV is still sitting on the Moon today, preserved perfectly because there is no weather to damage it.
Today in History
April 20, 1972
What does it feel like to drive a car where there are no roads, no air, and no gravity?
Imagine driving a car where there are no roads and you weigh almost nothing.
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NASA / Public domain
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vehicle dust exploring mission preserved