Apollo (spacecraft) Surface Experiment Packages ALSEP, the modularized equipment transporter (MET) (a hand-pulled equipment cart used on Apollo 14), the Lunar Rover (Apollo 15, 16 and 17), a surface television camera, surface tools, and lunar sample collection boxes. The ascent stage contained the crew cabin, instrument panels, overhead hatch/docking port, forward hatch, optical and electronic guidance systems, reaction control system, radar and communications antennas, ascent rocket engine and propellant to return to lunar orbit and rendezvous with the Apollo Command and Service Modules. The spacecraft–LM adapter (SLA), built by North American Aviation (Rockwell), was a conical aluminum structure which supported the service
Third-party evidence for Apollo Moon landings party observers could expect to see the various craft at specific times according to scheduled launch times and planned trajectories. The Soviet Union monitored the missions at their Space Transmissions Corps, which was "fully equipped with the latest intelligence-gathering and surveillance equipment." Vasily Mishin, in an interview for the article "The Moon Programme That Faltered," describes how the Soviet Moon programme dwindled after the Apollo landing. The missions were tracked by radar from several countries on the way to the Moon and back. A group at Kettering Grammar School, using simple radio equipment, monitored Soviet and U.S. spacecraft and calculated