Apollo Program · Lunar landing dress rehearsal

Apollo 10

Crewed flight
Launch
1969-05-18 16:49 UTC
Return
1969-05-26 16:53 UTC
Duration
8 days 00 hours 03 minutes

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Mission summary

Apollo 10 was the full dress rehearsal for the first lunar landing. Stafford, Young, and Cernan flew to the Moon and exercised the complete mission profile short of the surface itself — Stafford and Cernan descended in the Lunar Module 'Snoopy' to within 14.4 kilometers of the lunar surface, the closest crewed approach before Apollo 11 two months later. A briefly tumbling ascent stage during staging — caused by a switch left in the wrong position — gave Cernan and Stafford a few seconds of high adrenaline before recovery. The mission cleared every remaining unknown for Apollo 11.

Crew

Astronaut Prior missions Subsequent missions

Thomas P. Stafford

Commander

 Gemini 6A, Gemini 9A Apollo–Soyuz Test Project (1975)

John W. Young

Command Module Pilot

 Gemini 3, Gemini 10 Apollo 16 (Commander), STS-1 and STS-9 (Space Shuttle)

Eugene A. Cernan

Lunar Module Pilot

 Gemini 9A Apollo 17 (Commander) — last person on the Moon

Launch vehicle

Saturn V SA-505

Objectives

Milestones

When Event
1969-05-18 16:49 UTC Launched from LC-39B.

https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/apollo/missions/apollo10.html
1969-05-21 Lunar orbit insertion.

https://history.nasa.gov/SP-4029/Apollo_10a_Summary.htm
1969-05-22 Stafford and Cernan in LM 'Snoopy' descended to within ~14.4 km (47,400 ft) of the lunar surface — closest crewed approach before Apollo 11.

https://history.nasa.gov/SP-4029/Apollo_10a_Summary.htm
1969-05-22 LM ascent stage briefly tumbled during the staging maneuver due to a switch left in the wrong position; Stafford recovered manually.

https://www.nasa.gov/history/afj/ap10fj/index.html
1969-05-26 16:53 UTC Splashed down in the Pacific; recovered by USS Princeton.

https://history.nasa.gov/SP-4029/Apollo_10a_Summary.htm

Primary sources

Last updated 2026-05-09 15:17 UTC.