Lunar Flag Assembly flag, placed about from the centerline of the "Eagle" landing craft, was blown over by the blast of the rocket exhaust during takeoff. Because of this, care was taken by subsequent crews to place the flags at greater distances from the Lunar Module. The landing on Apollo 13 was aborted due to a major spacecraft malfunction encountered before reaching the Moon. The flag carried on that flight was destroyed with the Lunar Module "Aquarius" when it reentered the Earth's atmosphere. A review of photographs taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) indicates that flags placed during the Apollo 12, Apollo
Apollo command and service module a retrorocket to perform the deorbit burn for Earth orbital Apollo flights. The engine selected was the AJ10-137, which used Aerozine 50 as fuel and nitrogen tetroxide (NO) as oxidizer to produce of thrust. The thrust level was twice what was needed to accomplish the lunar orbit rendezvous (LOR) mission mode, because the engine was originally sized to lift the CSM off of the lunar surface in the direct ascent mode assumed in original planning (see Choosing a mission mode.) A contract was signed in April 1962 for the Aerojet-General company to start developing the engine, before the LOR mode