Mission Atlas
← Mission directory

Mission record

Lunar Orbiter 2

Also known as Orbiter II, Orbiter-B, Lunar Orbiter-B, LunarOrbiter2

NASA · Launched

Explore trajectory

Completed · Success

NASA lunar orbiter that photographed smooth areas of the lunar surface to select and verify safe landing sites for the Surveyor and Apollo missions. It returned 609 high resolution and 208 medium resolution frames, including a widely reproduced oblique view of Copernicus crater, and was commanded to impact the Moon on 11 October 1967.

Destinations
Moon
Launch vehicle
Atlas-Agena D
Launch site
Cape Canaveral, United States
Countries
United States
Mission types
Orbiter

Chronology

Mission timeline

  1. Launch

    Lunar Orbiter 2 launched

    Earth

  2. Milestone

    Photographic readout completed

    Moon

  3. Milestone

    Orbit inclination altered to 17.5 degrees for lunar gravity data

    Moon

  4. Impact

    Commanded impact on the lunar surface

    Moon

Mission architecture

Vehicles

  • Lunar Orbiter 2 · Orbiter

    Destinations: Moon

Trajectory record

Trajectory dataset not yet available

No verified trajectory dataset is committed for this mission, so Mission Atlas renders no path.

Provenance

Sources

Each source is listed once and labeled with the mission, event, trajectory, or destination/body context it supports.

Data verified through August 24, 2026