Apollo 11 Apollo 11 was an American Earth spacecraft which landed on the Moon on 20 July 1969 . Human s regarded this as the first Moon landing . Overview . History . Motivations for the landing . Around 1959 , an alien species had landed on the Moon and sent a transmission to Earth . They requested a meeting with human s so as to share technology . The America n government intercepted the transmission and started NASA ' s moon project to meet them . ( PROSE : " Blue Moon " ) The Silence , which controlled humanity up to that point , were also interested in the Moon landing in order for the human race to produce the astronaut suit . ( TV : " Day of the Moon " ) In popular culture , the Moon landing had much to do with the Americans ' rivalry with the Soviet Union and was known as the " Space Race " . ( PROSE : " Blue Moon " ) The mission . While " Apollo 11 " s " Saturn V " rocket was on the pad , prior its 16 July 1969 launch , the Eleventh Doctor entered the command module , " Columbia " , and installed a radio relay . ( TV : " Day of the Moon " ) Coordinated by Mission Control at the Kennedy Space Center , the " Apollo 11 " , powered by a " Saturn V " rocket , lifted off on 16 July . En route to the Moon , the crew encountered an alien species . Mission Control , as well as Torchwood , knew of this , but not the public . After getting caught by an overzealous secret services officer , Spencer , the Tenth Doctor ended up locked in the Center , though gained release in enough time to greet the aliens due to land on the Moon in a flying saucer prior to the " Apollo " . The Doctor convinced the aliens that humanity needed to develop on their own . The Doctor then witnessed the landing . ( PROSE : " Blue Moon " ) Martha Jones also personally witnessed the Moon landing four times with the Tenth Doctor , as opposed to watching it on television . ( TV : " Blink " ) The Eleventh Doctor interfered with the transmission of the landing , with the help of Canton Everett Delaware III and the relay that he had installed aboard " Columbia " . At the crucial moment that Neil Armstrong set foot on the Moon , they inserted footage of a Silent , ordering for its kind to be killed on sight . ( TV : " Day of the Moon " ) At some point before his seventh incarnation , the Doctor acquired bits of the " Apollo " moon landers , and kept them in his TARDIS . ( PROSE : " Echo " ) It was not generally known that dozens of people had set foot on the Moon prior to Armstrong as the United States government had built a on the far side of the Moon in the 1960s using alien technology . It was destroyed by the Sixth Doctor on 23 November 1963 . ( AUDIO : " " ) Furthermore , the Sixth Doctor and Peri Brown visited Mare Nectaris on the Moon in 1872 . ( AUDIO : " The First Sontarans " ) Iris Wildthyme also claimed to have visited the Moon before , and that she gave Neil and Buzz a fright when she drove up out of a crater flashing her TARDIS ' headlights . ( PROSE : " Minions of the Moon " ) Public reaction . A crowd gathered to watch the takeoff from the ground . ( PROSE : " Blue Moon " ) With interest in the landing so intense , public places virtually emptied as people all over the world glued themselves to their television s . ( PROSE : " One Small Step . . . " ) Half a billion people watched the footage of the Moon landing on television at the time it was originally broadcast . Due to the nature of the Silence , the footage the Doctor added was not remembered , but left as a subliminal message for present and future human generations . Following the landing , whenever an individual saw a Silent , they would attempt to kill it , unknowingly leading to the Silence ' s downfall . ( TV : " Day of the Moon " ) Legacy . According to the Eleventh Doctor , every one of the billions of human s to come in the billions of years after 1969 would would watch the Moon landing at least once , to see mankind taking its first step on extraterrestrial soil . ( TV : " Day of the Moon " ) Richard Lazarus estimated that his work with the Genetic Manipulation Device would prove as important to mankind as that achievement . ( TV : " The Lazarus Experiment " ) Behind the scenes . Prior to the real actual touchdown on the Moon , " Moon Landing " in " TV Comic " had already ( obviously inaccurately ) shown it happening for the first time exactly one year later " to the day " , in 1970 .