Al Worden’s NASA Years
-
- Five new astronauts in 1966.
-
- As a brand new astronaut in 1966.
-
- My official portrait when joining NASA, holding a Lunar Module model.
-
- The T-38 jet was our main form of transportation as astronauts.
-
- Inside an Apollo command module simulator.
-
- With fellow Apollo astronaut Stu Roosa, survival training in Panama, June 1967.
-
- With Fred Haise and Jerry Carr during planetarium training.
-
- Planetarium training with a (sleeping?) Jack Swigert.
-
- Desert survival training.
-
- 1967 desert survival training.
-
- Survival training in Panama, 1967.
-
- Driving Paul Newman’s Formula Ford in Riverside, California, around 1970.
-
- Driving Paul Newman’s racecar.
-
- With two of my heroes, Dick Gordon and Mike Collins.
-
- With my daughters Alison and Merrill in my space-age Houston apartment, 1970.
-
- Explaining the SIM bay operations to the press using a model of the command and service module, 1971.
-
- Training for Apollo 15, 1971.
-
- Studying lunar geology with the irrepressible Farouk El-Baz, 1971.
-
- One of Emilio Pucci’s second-draft ideas for our mission patch.
-
- One of Emilio Pucci’s second-draft ideas for our mission patch.
-
- The Apollo 15 mission patch final design.
-
- Our Saturn V rocket.
-
- Deke Slayton shakes hands with my father before we come down the ramp to the launch pad on launch day. My sister Carolyn is on the far left.
-
- My father reaches out to touch my hand as I begin my journey to the launch pad.
-
- A final goodbye to my father before leaving Earth.
-
- The view at the top of our rocket.
-
- The launch of Apollo 15.
-
- The launch of our immense Saturn V rocket.
-
- Docking with and extracting the Lunar Module in space.
-
- The beautiful planet earth receding as we headed for the moon.
-
- The magnificent lunar surface from orbit.
-
- The moon was an alien world, but somehow reassuringly familiar.
-
- Artist’s impression of the SIM bay I operated in lunar orbit.
-
- I was fascinated by the dramatic long shadows where the sun was rising or setting on the moon.
-
- I never grew tired of watching Earth rise above the moon.
-
- The magnificent Tsiolkovsky crater from lunar orbit.
-
- Earthrise.
-
- My name attached to the lunar rover, left on the surface of the moon.
-
- The Fallen Astronaut sculpture left on the surface of the moon, with a list of known deceased astronauts and cosmonauts.
-
- Flying solo around the moon with the SIM bay exposed.
-
- Launching a tiny satellite into lunar orbit.
-
- An artist’s impression of my spacewalk, while Jim Irwin watches me from the hatch.
-
- Looking at a copy of the painting Pierre Mion did of my view during my spacewalk.
-
- The television camera image of me floating in the deep blackness of space.
-
- The only film still of my deep space EVA.
-
- A ghostly television image of my spacewalk.
-
- The television image of our press conference in space.
-
- The heart stopping moment of parachute failure as we neared splashdown.
-
- Splashdown!
-
- The USS Okinawa, the ship that recovered us from the ocean after splashdown.
-
- Recovery crews rendezvous with our floating spacecraft.
-
- The Apollo 15 mission ends as I climb out of our charred spacecraft.
-
- I am winched up from the ocean after exiting the spacecraft.
-
- Unshaven, I thank the welcoming crowd on the deck of the ship after splashdown.
-
- My parents and daughters around the time of my space flight.
-
- With my brother Pete a month after my flight.
-
- With Sally, my sister, a month after my flight.
-
- With my brother Jerry in September 1971.
-
- With my parents, sisters and two of my brothers in September 1971.
-
- With my sisters, and brothers Jerry and Pete in September 1971.
-
- My speech receives a standing ovation during a joint meeting of Congress.
-
- With Ambassador to the United Nations George H.W. Bush during the post-flight celebrations.
-
- With President Richard Nixon at the White House.
-
- Receiving the Collier Trophy from Vice President Agnew.
-
- With MSC Director Bob Gilruth, one of the most decent people I have ever known, at the Collier Trophy ceremonies.
-
- With NASA’s Bob Seamans at the Schilling Award dinner.
-
- With King Baudouin I and Queen Fabiola of Belgium during the post-flight world tour.
-
- With French Prime Minister Jacques Chaban-Delmas during our world tour.
-
- With my former high school principal, Earl Holman, on my post-flight visit back to Jackson.
-
- The incredible welcome I received back in my home town.
-
- With my family during my Jackson homecoming.
-
- With Congressman Chuck Chamberlin at my Jackson homecoming.
-
- My Jackson homecoming parade.
-
- My 1972 Air Force portrait.
-
- How I looked when I worked at NASA’s Ames center in the early-to-mid 1970s.
Back to Falling to Earth Extras
Currently reading your book- facinating! Thanks for posting these pictures!
Al,
Thank you for your book. I’ve already read many others on the space program and found yours at the local Borders when they were closing. Didn’t even know about it. Read it on my flight from Phoenix to Philadelpha. Great read, thank you for writing your side. You did a great job and I highly recommend it to others. I placed it in my office right next to “DEKE”. Thought you might like to know that!
Doug
Al. Such a great life. Such a great, emotional and hard to endure story. You did well to share your life story with us. I loved the book, the way you write it with this superbe humility. Your book is in my personal pantheon of space age key books. Congrats from France, Regards, Alexis de Gemini.