Apollo Venus Flyby

Mission Profile

Apollo Venus Flyby was a 1967 NASA concept study exploring whether an Apollo Command and Service Module crew could conduct a flyby of Venus during a planned return trajectory, potentially adding the first crewed interplanetary encounter to the Apollo program without significant additional hardware. The concept emerged from planning for a 1973 conjunction opportunity where a Saturn V-launched Apollo crew could fly to Venus at relatively modest energy cost using planetary alignment. While technically feasible, the concept was never seriously funded as NASA focused Apollo hardware entirely on the lunar landing goal and subsequent budget cuts eliminated any extended program ambitions.