This magnificent photograph taken during the only stand up EVA performed on the Moon as the Sun was rising over Hadley Base shows the giant Mount Hadley Delta and fantastic details of the moonscape including Silver Spur in the far left background and Last Crater in the mid distance to the left. Mount Hadley Delta has a height of 3.6 km above the plain in the foreground.

Shortly after the LM Falcon landed on the Delta called Hadley-Apennine near the north center of the Moon, Scott and Irwin gave the scientists in Houston a thorough description of the surrounding countryside and, rather than restricting themselves to the views out the forward-facing windows, they donned helmets and gloves for what was known as a “Stand-up EVA”, the only one performed on the Moon. They bled all the air out of the cabin, then Commander David Scott opened the overhead hatch. Standing on the ascent engine cover with his upper body outside the spacecraft, and bracing himself in the opening he took a series of pictures all the way round the horizon with the Hasselblad 70-mm camera.

With towering mountains on either side, a broad valley floor, and a rille canyon, the landscape of Hadley-Apennine surrounded Apollo 15 with the most varied terrain that Apollo astronauts would ever explore. (Reynolds, p. 178).

“There’s nothing on the Earth that compares with it [the lunar surface]. I’ve never read anything that can adequately describe how well you can see. Whatever that means. It’s crisp, and it’s clear, and it’s distinct, and it’s definitive.” David Scott (from the ALSJ mission transcript at 107:10:40 GET).