1970 in spaceflight 1970 in spaceflight Japan and China each launched their first satellites in 1970, bringing the total number of nations with independent launch capability to five. Apollo 13 was launched; after suffering an explosion in deep space it had to circumnavigate the moon and use the LM as a life boat. Apollo 13 was a successful disaster in which the crew survived. The Soviet space program continued its Luna program with Luna 17, which delivered the robotic Lunokhod 1 rover to the lunar surface, and Luna 16, which achieved the first unmanned lunar sample return. The Soviets also continued the success
Apollo 21 in orbit. Some people have speculated that tentative plans of an "Apollo 21" might have been made assuming availability of the extra Saturn V that would have left, although by the time NASA resumed planning manned missions using this numbering sequence (defined on April 24, 1967), the dual-Saturn IB plan had been replaced with the single Saturn V. There is no evidence NASA ever planned an eleventh Moon landing mission. Apollo 21 "Apollo 21" is an apocryphal reference to an eleventh manned Moon landing mission of NASA's Apollo program. Apollo contracted for the construction of fifteen Saturn V launch vehicles