Mitchell (on the right) with Roosa and Shepard, his fellow Apollo 14 colleagues.
(Mirror Daily, United States) – The sixth man that walked on the surface of the Moon, Edgar Mitchell died at age of 87. The former astronaut passed away on the eve of his number 45 moonwalk anniversary on the 4th of February 2016. There are only seven astronomers left from the total twelve that had the opportunity to walk on the Moon.
Neil Armstrong, the icon of America, the first person to have stepped on the lunar surface died four years ago, on the 25th of August, 2012 at the venerable age of 82. Armstrong was a graduate of the University of Perdue and on the 21st of July 1969, when he was the first human to have ever taken a step on the surface of the Moon he was only 38 years of age.
Buzz Aldrin, the second man on the moon, Neil Armstrong’s fellow Apollo 11 colleague, lived a very tumultuous life. Aldrin, who was a pilot in the Air Force, did not continue his career as an astronaut when they returned on the planet. He took a desk job instead and became a manager.
He was a very charismatic and popular character and that landed him a lot of television interviews in which he used to talk about the moon landing. In 1993, he actually assisted in the development of a Buzz Aldrin video game. He struggled with alcohol addiction and depression for a good part of his life.
The third man on the Moon, Pete Conrad, took his first step on our natural satellite on the 19th of November 1969. He was the commander of the Gemini XI, the rocket that was used in the Apollo 12 mission.
The commander of the second moon landing had a prodigious NASA career, returning to space as commander of the Skylab 2 mission. He died at only 69 years of age after a motorcycle accident.
The fourth man on the Moon, and Conrad’s companion in the Apollo 12 and Skylab 2 missions, Alan Bean, is still alive today. He retired in 1981 and is now enjoying his new hobby, painting.
Alan Shepard, the man that was also present in the Apollo 13 failure, and who was also the first American to reach outer space, put his foot on the Moon on the 5th of February 1971. He continued to work at NASA until retirement. He passed away at the respectable age of 74.
David Scott landed on the Moon on the 31st of July, 1971. He was a part of the Apollo 15 mission. Apart from that, he is also one of the only three men to have ever traveled to the moon and orbit the planet.
James Irwin was Scott’s colleague on the Apollo 15. He and the other members of the crew managed to illegally transport some stamps to the Moon and back. The stamps were sold to a German dealer and the children of the crew received a trust fund.
There were consequences for this actions, as the crew was obligated by NASA to take on non-flight positions. Irwin died in 1991 after a series of serious heart attacks.
John Young and Charles Duke were the first people to ever fly a mission that involved a space shuttle. They were a part of the Apollo 16 mission that landed on the lunar surface in 1972. Both former astronauts are still alive.
The last people that had a chance to take a lunar stroll, for now, are Harrison Schmitt and Eugene Cernan who landed on the satellite in December 1972. They were the first and only scientists that have ever reached the lunar surface. Both are alive but retired.
Image source: www.wikipedia.org
