Universal Encyclopedia
What was the Moon landing of 1969?
Four hundred thousand people, one Saturn V, and eight days that took humanity off its planet — for the first and, so far, only time.
Last updated: October 2026
On 20 July 1969, Apollo 11’s lunar module Eagle touched down on the Sea of Tranquility, and Neil Armstrong became the first human to walk on another world. Watched by an estimated 600 million people — a fifth of humanity — the landing was the climax of the Space Race and remains humanity’s greatest single technological feat.