Lunar Orbiter 1 was the first of five unmanned missions Intended to help select Apollo landing sites by mapping the Moon's surface, they provided the first photographs from lunar orbit and photographed both the Moon and Earth.
Lunar Orbiter 1 was launched from Launch Complex 13 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on August 10, 1966 onboard and Atlas SLV-3 Agena-D launch vehicle.
The Spacecraft was injected into an elliptical near-equatorial lunar orbit 92.1 hours after launch and orbited the moon 577 times in two and a half months.
The mission was ended earlier than expected on October 29, 1966 by deliberately crashing into the lunar surface on the far side of the moon because the vehicle suffered a fuel leak and if it was left in lunar orbit I could have been a hazard to the manned Apollo missions.
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