# What happened to the missing Apollo missions?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-missing-apollo-missions/1969>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [July 15, 1999, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-missing-apollo-missions/1969 "1999-07-15T15:09:00Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\
**Post date:** [July 15, 1999, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-missing-apollo-missions/1969/1 "1999-07-15T15:09:00Z")

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Watching This History Channel this week, there is a series called “Moon Shot”. Monday was the Mercury Program, Tuesday was Gemini, and last night was Apollos 1, 7 and 8. Apollo 1 was the tragedy in the capsule, 7 was the first Apollo shot into orbit and 8 went around the moon.

Ok, so what happened to Apollo 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6?

Granted, a 1 hour show on The History Channel is not likely to be all inclusive, but I don’t remember ever hearing about thos missions.

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**Author:** ![system](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/original/2X/e/e489c3b7d8fce19c4b355dd4fc3f88cc39c34b87.png) [@system](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/system)\
**Post date:** [July 15, 1999, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-missing-apollo-missions/1969/2 "1999-07-15T15:30:00Z")

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They were unmanned test misisons.

Check out [http://www.ksc.nasa.gov/history/apollo/apollo.html](http://www.ksc.nasa.gov/history/apollo/apollo.html)

They have info on all the Apollo missions including 4, 5 and 6. They were basically to test things like structural integrity and instrument performance.

They don’t have anything under Apollo 2 or 3, but they do have misisons labeled Apollo-Saturn 201, 202 and 203. The name change occurred after the Apollo 1 tragedy.

From [http://www.ksc.nasa.gov/history/apollo/apollo-1/apollo-1.html](http://www.ksc.nasa.gov/history/apollo/apollo-1/apollo-1.html)

> [@](#):
>
> In the spring of 1967, (NASA) announced that the mission originally scheduled for Grissom, White and Chaffee would be known as Apollo 1, and said that the first Saturn V launch, scheduled for November 1967, would be  
> known as Apollo 4. The eventual launch of AS-204 became known as the Apollo 5 mission (no missions or flights were ever designated Apollo 2 and 3).

Alphagene