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A Tribute to the men and women of
Honeysuckle Creek Tracking Station, Canberra, Australia

the wider Australian involvement
in manned and unmanned space exploration, and more!

Updated 01 August 2018. | News 25 May 2017.

Featured: August 2018.

Honeysuckle Creek tracks Apollo 15

As darkness fell, on Wednesday 4th August 1971, Hamish Lindsay took this photo of the Honeysuckle Creek antenna tracking Apollo 15 in lunar orbit. The CSM was in its 68th revolution of the Moon

The photo was taken from around this spot between two boulders adjacent to the antenna pad.

Negative scan and image processing: Colin Mackellar.
(This image has been pushed to bring out details.)

Earlier, some time after 4:00pm, Hamish took this photo of the Moon rising above the Honeysuckle Operations Building. (The Moon has risen at 2:25pm sunset was at 5:23pm.)

The Apollo 15 crew had completed their lunar surface activities, and were back together in Lunar Orbit. The CSM was in its 67th revolution of the Moon. Negative scan: Colin Mackellar.

See also Previous featured items.

Message from Christopher Kraft, 14 March 1974, on the occasion of Honeysuckle leaving the Manned Space Flight Network.

Planning for the 50th Anniversary of Apollo 11.

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Also see some related (and some unrelated!) video at vimeo.com/honeysuckle.


A beautiful setting Website by Colin Mackellar – photo taken 09 October 1971.	Honeysuckle and Apollo 11 The Apollo 11 Mission. Apollo 11 TV. Search for the tapes.

Apollo 11 40th The Apollo 11 40th anniversary celebrations in July 2009.	The Honeysuckle Creek DVDs Including Ed von Renouard’s Apollo 11 Super 8 movie – and the full Restored Apollo 11 EVA.


Australian Prime Minister John Gorton visits Honeysuckle Creek on the day of the Moon Landing, Monday 21 July 1969. Silent film (14MB MPEG4 file).	The Prime Minister after his tour inside Honeysuckle’s Operations building. Unedited news film runs for 5'14". A 21MB MPEG4 file.
Both clips courtesy of the ABC. See more of the Prime Minister’s visit here.

What really happened with the Apollo 11 TV signal. More here.

One Small Step: The Australian Story

Watch “One Small Step: The Australian Story”, produced by Freehand TV in Sydney for the BBC, for the 40th anniversary in 2009.
This is a unique account of Australia’s role, and features key players from Honeysuckle Creek, Tidbinbilla and Parkes. Recommended. On YouTube.

(If you’ve seen the Australian comedy “The Dish”,
watch this to discover what actually happened.)

The Honeysuckle antenna today

The old Honeysuckle antenna was used for its last official track in January 2010.

DSS46 photos.

And here’s a tribute page of photos on the occasion of the shutdown.