Rubin Local · measured lunar terrain
Apollo 17
Taurus–Littrow at the start of EVA 1
Loading the sealed Apollo 17 package…
100 km starting altitude · 100 km/s default (about 60× orbital speed). WASD travels, Q/E changes altitude. Cruise follows a great circle; this is navigation, not orbital dynamics. Global elevation resolves roughly 950 m at the equator; Apollo uses much finer survey data. Small global craters are unresolved by the survey. The optional estimated layer generates plausible craters; those positions and shapes are invented. A 1.5 km transition joins the two surveys.
Loading moon buggy…
Buggy: B enters/leaves, W/S accelerate/reverse, A/D steer, Space brakes, C switches camera. Click the scene to use keys. Drag to look around. Driving is a simplified simulation on measured terrain.
In a headset, look level in any comfortable direction before entry. The complete measured site rotates together so Earth starts ahead at its correct 45.1° elevation. No controllers are needed. On a desktop, drag to look; wheel changes field of view. WASD or arrows move, Shift speeds up, Q/E lower/raise your terrain-following altitude. Home or R returns to the landing site. Click a sourced landmark to zip there. VR begins at your selected location. Press H to hide this pane.
An original base-layout concept placed here for exploration. This is not an official SpaceX design or a proposed landing site.
Loading terrain coverage…
Approximate mission-era models from archival references, not surveyed artifact geometry.
- Place
- 20.1911° N, 30.7723° E
- Time
- 1972-12-11 23:54:49 UTC
- Earth
- 240.70° azimuth · 45.11° elevation · 1.88° wide
- Sun
- 96.60° azimuth · 15.24° elevation
What is measured, calculated, and transformed?
Earth is a textured, illuminated 3D sphere at the correct angular size and orientation. The surface map is a modern cloud-free NASA composite. It is not December 1972 weather.
Fine dust grains and their shading are procedural surface detail, not additional measured rocks or craters. Turn off fine lunar dust detail to compare with the survey surface. Desktop uses finer detail and higher-resolution shadows; VR uses a lighter profile.
The moon buggy is an original Apollo-style Blender model with simplified steering, suspension, and terrain following, not a mission-certified vehicle dynamics simulation.
The bright lunar surface hides stars under normal eye adaptation. The scene does not add decorative stars.