Surveyor 3, launched April 27, 1967, was the third lander of the Surveyor program. It landed on April 20 in Ocean Procellarum. Actually, it bounced a couple of times before making a soft landing. Surveyor 3 performed soil samples using a scoop, digging trenches that were photographed and transmitted to Earth. The first lunar nightfall came on May 3 and when dawn came 14 Earth-days later, Surveyor 3 could not be reactivated.
Apollo 12 used Surveyor 3 as a target, landing within walking distance. Commander Charles Conrad Jr and Alan Bean, Lunar Module Pilot collected several components from Surveyor 3 and returned them to Earth, to study the long-term effects of exposure to the lunar environment on human-made stuff.
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