Word: craterous
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...think I can see my crater, Hey, there it is! There...
...real excitement and significance of the second moon-landing mission: the newfound precision that enables the U.S. to pick a destination on the moon's rugged surface and reach it as reliably as a taxicab finds a street address in Manhattan. Directly ahead of Intrepid lay the five craters that form the familiar pattern of "Snowman." Guided unerringly by the spacecraft computer. Astronauts Conrad and Alan Bean headed straight toward the target picked months earlier in Houston: Surveyor Crater, which forms Snowman's torso and is the spot where 21 years ago the unmanned Surveyor 3 landed...
...Crater's Edge. Only 500 ft. above the surface, Navy Pilot Conrad took control of the LM for the final few seconds of the descent, while Bean read data from the instrument panel: "Forty-two ft., coming down at three [ft. per sec.]. Forty coming down at two. Looking good. Thirty-one, 30 ft., you've got plenty of gas, plenty of gas, Pete. Stay in there. Eighteen ft., coming down. He's got it made. Come on in there. Contact lights!" Although thick dust kicked up by the LM's rocket engine obscured his view...
...Surveyor Crater. "Conrad's Parking Lot"-the landing site chosen by Conrad -was on the opposite side of the crater, just 800 ft. away. The pinpoint landing on a target 230,000 miles away from the launch pad at Cape Kennedy boded well for the remainder of Apollo 12's mission. Even more important, it proved that U.S. space scientists had profited from the lessons of Apollo 11 -which overshot its target by four miles -and could now confidently plan for manned exploration of the more rugged highland regions of the moon...
...presence and reported it to earth. "Can the guy with the seismometer hear me running?" Conrad asked. Responded Houston: "Looks as though you're really thundering by it." Conrad also tested the seismometer by tossing a rock-he called it an "extra grapefruit-size goody"-into a small crater. The instrument promptly signaled to Houston that it had detected the lunar version of the rolling stones...