Space History Photo: Apollo 8 Recovery

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The Apollo 8 Crew stands in the door of a recovery helicopter. (Image credit: NASA.)

In this historical photo from the U.S. space agency, the Apollo 8 crew stands in the doorway of a recovery helicopter after arriving aboard the carrier U.S.S. Yorktown, recovery vessel for the historic initial manned lunar orbital mission. In left foreground is astronaut Frank Borman, Mission Commander. Behind Borman is astronaut James A. Lovell Jr., Command Module pilot; and on the right is astronaut William A. Anders, Lunar Module pilot.

Apollo 8 splashed down at 10:51 a.m. (EST), December 27, 1968, in the central Pacific Ocean, approximately 1,000 miles south-southwest of Hawaii.

Each weekday, SPACE.com looks back at the history of spaceflight through photos (archive).

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U.S. Space Agency

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is the U.S. government agency in charge of the civilian space program as well as aeronautics and aerospace research. Founded in 1958, NASA is a civilian space agency aimed at exploring the universe with space telescopes,  satellites, robotic spacecraft, astronauts and more. The space agency has 10 major centers based across the U.S. and launches robotic and crewed missions from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral Florida. It's astronaut corps is based at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. To follow NASA's latest mission, follow the space agency on Twitter or any other social channel, of visit: nasa.gov.