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- [Man] Guidance, internal.

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Ignition sequence start.

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Engines on.

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(orchestral music)

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- Apollo 15 that was launched 50 years ago

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on July the 26th, 1971.

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It was a

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relatively big step from
the previous three missions.

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As president Nixon stated,

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it would be the most ambitious

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scientific exploration
in space at that time.

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The three astronauts were
Commander David Scott,

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Command Module Pilot, Al Worden,

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and Lunar Module Pilot, Jim Irwin.

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The Lunar Rover was an
electrically driven, bare bones car

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to allow the astronauts to
cover much greater distance

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on the moon than than the previous

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three flights could accomplish.

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- [Man 2] This is really a
rock and roll ride, isn't it?

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Never been on a ride like this before.

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Boy, oh boy.

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- [John] It had a top speed
of about eight miles an hour,

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although I think in later flights,

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they actually cranked that
up to about 11 miles an hour.

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Scott and Irwin spent three days exploring

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the Apennine Hadley
region in the Lunar Rover.

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There's actually a plaque
on the Lunar Rover vehicle

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that was left on the moon that says

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"Man's first wheels on the moon."

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The heavy focus on science for Apollo 15

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was its primary feature.

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It was achieved two ways.

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One, of course, with
the Lunar Rover vehicle

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on the moon to gather more lunar data.

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And secondly, the command service module

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carried a SIM bay of
scientific instruments

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that allowed Al Worden to
gather many photographs

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and much data as he circled the moon

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for his three days in orbit.

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One of the interesting
experiments that Scott performed

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on the moon was to
demonstrate Galileo's theory

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that two objects will
always drop at the same rate

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in an airless environment.

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- [Man 2] Well I'll drop it.

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And I'll drop the two of them here

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and hopefully they'll hit
the ground at the same time.

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How about that?

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- [John] Scott and Irwin,
while they were doing

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their lunar rock studies on the moon,

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came across a single rock

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that was determined to be
over 4 billion years old.

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It was called the Genesis Rock.

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Scott and Irwin spent
over 18 hours on the moon,

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the longest time of any of the
Apollo missions at that time.

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And they gathered 170 pounds

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of lunar material to bring back.

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They also set out the Apollo
lunar experiments package.

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In a private moment, Commander David Scott

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made a small aluminum
statue of an astronaut

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on the moon

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to memorialize the 14 astronauts

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that the died in the
U.S. and Soviet programs.

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The Lunar Rover had a TV camera on it,

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and for the first time
we were privileged to see

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the asset stage take off from the moon.

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After Scott and Irwin were
back in the command module,

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they continued to orbit
the moon for two days,

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and during that time deployed

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the Particles and Fields satellite.

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During the flight back to earth,

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one of the most important
tasks required of the crew

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was for Al Worden to EVA
from the command module

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and to capture the cassettes that recorded

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all the data that he'd accumulated

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during his orbits with the moon.

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That was the first time at
197,000 miles from earth

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that man has ever done a deep space EVA.

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(orchestral music)

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During re-entry the burning
reaction control system fuel

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burned through the risers
of one of the shoots,

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and that shoot streamed
and effectively became

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about one fifth of its normal capacity.

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Apollo 15 landed on two shoots.

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It was designed to do that,

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but it did mean a hard
landing, but a safe landing.

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Apollo 15 broke several records.

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The first use of the Lunar Rover,

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the first deep space walk by Al Worden,

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the heaviest payload in lunar
orbit it as 107,000 pounds,

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and the longest crewed
lunar mission of 295 hours.

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Apollo 15 achieved all of its objectives