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The Moon has been an important source of inspiration and knowledge in human history, having been crucial to cosmography, mythology, religion, art, time keeping, natural science and spaceflight. The first spaceflights to an extraterrestrial body were to the Moon, starting in 1959 with the flyby of Luna 1 (sent by the Soviet Union), and the intentional impact of Luna 2, followed in 1966 by the first soft landing (by Luna 9) and orbital insertion (by Luna 10). Humans first arrived in orbit with Apollo 8 (sent by the United States) on December 24, 1968, and then on the surface with Apollo 11 on July 20, 1969, making the Moon the only celestial body beyond Earth that humans have visited. By 1972, six Apollo missions had landed twelve people on the Moon and stayed up to three days. Renewed robotic exploration of the Moon, in particular to confirm the presence of water on the Moon, has fueled plans to return humans to the Moon, starting with the Artemis program
The Moon has been an important source of inspiration and knowledge in human history, having been crucial to cosmography, mythology, religion, art, time keeping, natural science and spaceflight. The first spaceflights to an extraterrestrial body were to the Moon, starting in 1959 with the flyby of Luna 1 (sent by the Soviet Union), and the intentional impact of Luna 2, followed in 1966 by the first soft landing (by Luna 9) and orbital insertion (by Luna 10). Humans first arrived in orbit with Apollo 8 (sent by the United States) on December 24, 1968, and then on the surface with Apollo 11 on July 20, 1969, making the Moon the only celestial body beyond Earth that humans have visited. By 1972, six Apollo missions had landed twelve people on the Moon and stayed up to three days. Renewed robotic exploration of the Moon, in particular to confirm the presence of water on the Moon, has fueled plans to return humans to the Moon, starting with the Artemis program