Fact sheet
60015 is a highly-shocked ferroan anorthosite (~98% plagioclase). The plagioclase shows extensive evidence of shock (patchy and undulose extinction) and melting, but maskelynite is not reported. The highly-shocked plagioclase includes bubble-like melt inclusions with a very high index of refraction. Pyroxene grains are rounded and also show evidence of shock. Some orthopyroxene occurs as thin “stringers” along feldspar crystals. Pyroxene aggregates in the groundmass contain associated ilmenite, Cr-spinel, metallic iron and troilite (all in low abundance). No olivine is reported.
The sample weighed 5574 grams before analysis and is 3.5±0.05 billion years old (Ar/Ar).
Further details of this and other Apollo samples are here: http://curator.jsc.nasa.gov/lunar/
Our thin section is slightly thick so between crossed polars some plagioclase crystals are yellow instead of shades of grey.
The Apollo 16 landing site was in the hilly region around Descartes crater in the lunar highlands. The landing spot was chosen to allow the astronauts to gather geologically older lunar material (Descartes Formation and the Cayley Formation) than the samples obtained in the first four landings, which were in or near lunar maria.
The mission lasted 11.1 days, with a stay on the lunar surface of 71 hours. The crew were on the lunar surface for 20.2 hours during which they traversed approximately 27 kilometers and collected approximately 96 kilograms of samples.
Apollo 16 was launched on 16 April 1972.