More than 40 years after the first Apollo landing, Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos plans to bring the rocket responsible for putting man on the moon back from the ocean floor.
[See spectacular snapshots of space.]
Wednesday, Bezos' private team of explorers announced that they found the Apollo 11 engines 14,000 feet below the Atlantic Ocean's surface.
"We're making plans to raise one or more of them from the ocean floor," he said in a statement. "We don't know yet what condition these engines might be in -- they hit the ocean at high velocity and have been in salt water for more than 40 years. On the other hand, they're made of tough stuff, so we'll see."
On July 16, 1969, Five F-1 rocket engines helped launch the Apollo 11 mission and put man on the moon for the first time. Bezos' team will have their work cut out for them -- each engine is 19 feet tall and weighs about 18,500 pounds.
[Read International Space Station Nearly Struck by Space Junk.]
Bezos said the engines remain the property of NASA, and that he expects the engines will be donated to the Smithsonian Institution if his quest is successful.
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Keukasmallie of NY 8:56AM March 29, 2012
Pacoguad 8:54AM March 29, 2012