Kennedy Space Center Apollo 8's lunar orbiting mission. The next two missions tested the Lunar Module: Apollo 9 (Earth orbit) and Apollo 10 (lunar orbit). Apollo 11, launched from Pad A on July 16, 1969, made the first Moon landing on July 20. Apollo 12 followed four months later. From 1970–1972, the Apollo program concluded at KSC with the launches of missions 13 through 17. On May 14, 1973, the last Saturn V launch put the Skylab space station in orbit from Pad 39A. By this time, the Cape Kennedy pads 34 and 37 used for the Saturn IB were decommissioned, so Pad
Artificial satellites in retrograde orbit day over Israel and the surrounding countries, though this optimal Sun-synchronized orbit degrades after several months. They were launched in retrograde orbit so that launch debris would land in the Mediterranean Sea, and not over populated neighboring countries on an eastward flight path. The United States launched two Future Imagery Architecture (FIA) radar satellites into 122° inclined retrograde orbits in 2010 and 2012. The use of a retrograde orbit suggest that these satellites employ SAR techniques. Earth-observing satellites may also be launched into a sun-synchronous orbit, which is slightly retrograde. This is typically done in order to keep a constant