Apollo 8 launched, carrying the first humans to the Moon
On this day · 21 December 1968
On December 21, 1968, Apollo 8 roared off the pad and became the first crewed mission to leave Earth's orbit and circle the Moon.
On December 21, 1968, a Saturn V rocket lifted off from Kennedy Space Center at 7:51 a.m. EST, carrying three men farther from home than anyone had ever traveled. Frank Borman, James Lovell, and William Anders were aboard Apollo 8, the first crewed spacecraft to leave Earth’s gravitational grip and reach another world.
It was a bold leap. This was the first crewed launch of the giant Saturn V, and the plan skipped straight to lunar orbit without a landing. The crew circled the Moon ten times over Christmas, beaming back the first human views of the lunar surface and reading from the Book of Genesis on Christmas Eve.
From lunar orbit Anders snapped Earthrise, the photograph of a blue planet hanging over a gray horizon that reframed how people saw their home. Apollo 8 splashed down safely on December 27, proving the path to the 1969 landing was open.
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