Imagine a Christmas on Moon by Apollo 8

The first flight of astronauts to the moon is the 50th anniversary. Since then we also see the planet Earth with different eyes.

On Christmas Eve 1968 - that is, tomorrow 50 years ago - an estimated 600 million television viewers around the world experienced something out of the ordinary. The Apollo 8 astronauts made live recordings from the lunar surface to the earth and read from the creation story.

 Capsule Commander Frank Borman (today 90) solemnly ended the transmission with the phrase, "We conclude with a good night, good luck, happy Christmas and God bless you all - all of you on the good earth."

Borman and Jim Lovell, 90, and Bill Anders, 85, were on a truly historic mission. Two and a half hours after the launch on December 21 at the Cape Canaveral spaceport in Florida, USA, they received permission for TLI - Trans-lunar Injection, the Journey to the Moon.

An image that changed the view of the Earth dwellers

For the first time in history, humans left the earth's magnetism and stared at a strange celestial body - the earth satellite 384,400 kilometers away.

Borman shot perhaps the most important recording of the twentieth century during her orbit around the moon on December 24th. In the foreground the gray, repellent moon with its cratered surface, behind it the blue planet, which in the pitch-black universe shimmers invitingly, but also touching blue and white.

Hardly any other image has changed the view of the Earth dwellers on their planet more.

The earth, "a great oasis in the wastelands of space"

Suddenly, many were aware of how vulnerable and fragile our home planet is. The photo has greatly inspired the environmental movement and promoted "global awareness," say many astronauts today.

Bill Anders was obviously aware of this effect. During the journey, he called the earth «a great oasis in the wastelands of the universe. Ulrich Koehler, planetary scientist at the German Aerospace Center, said this week in a broadcast by SWR Wissen: "This photo has certainly not only moved NASA's technocrats and astronauts and engineers and scientists but of course, of course, the humans themselves, who have seen that the earth is a small grain of sand in the infinity of the universe. "It is forever a photo icon of humanity.

The moon has been free of humans for 46 years

After Apollo 8, two more missions followed until on 20 July 1969, for the first time, people set foot on the Earth's satellite. By the end of 1972, the Americans carried out six more missions to the moon - ten more astronauts reached the celestial body.

Then it was over. The moon has been free of humans for 46 years. When it comes to a new journey, is in the stars.