Two long-lost engines from Apollo-era rockets have been hauled from a depth of more than 4km in the Atlantic Ocean. The F-1 engines are from the first stage of a Saturn rocket, which were used throughout the Apollo programme – one of which launched men to the Moon.
A number of engines were first found nearly a year ago by Bezos Expeditions, run by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.
The two recovered engines will now be restored and put on public display. The F-1 was a workhorse engine for the US space agency Nasa as the most powerful single-chamber liquid-fuelled engine ever developed. Five F-1 engines sat at the bottom of the Saturn-V rockets used throughout the Apollo programme.
After three weeks at sea, the Bezos Expeditions team recovered two such engines using remotely-operated vehicles.
Because the engines’ serial numbers are partially missing, it remains unclear which Apollo mission they are from – that may become clearer during restoration.