Apollo 11 Rocket Engine Part Recovered

On July 16, 1969, Apollo 11 was launched on its mission to put the first men on the moon.

Forty-four years later, a rocket engine from the Saturn 5 launch vehicle was recovered from the ocean floor. It was positively identified as an engine from Apollo 11's Saturn 5 rocket.

The Huffington Post reported:

Forty-four years (and three days) after it helped launch the first men to walk on the moon, a huge rocket engine part salvaged from the ocean floor has been positively identified as a historic component of the Apollo 11 lunar landing mission. 

"I'm thrilled to share some exciting news," Amazon.com founder and CEO Jeff Bezos wrote Friday (July 19) on his Bezos Expeditions website. "44 years ago tomorrow [July 20] Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon, and now we have recovered a critical technological marvel that made it all possible." 

In March 2012, the billionaire entrepreneur underwrote a private — and secret — expedition to find and recover the Apollo engines that launched astronauts Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins to the moon.

To read more of this fascinating story, go here.