Commander of Apollo 13 mission, Jim Lovell, dies

The commander of the Apollo 13 mission has died. Jim Lovell was 97 years old.

The Apollo 13 mission was supposed to send astronauts to the moon but when an oxygen tank exploded during their trip to the moon, the mission changed drastically, and was considered a “successful failure,” when the three men on board returned to Earth safely, The Associated Press and CBS News reported.

“NASA sends its condolences to the family of Capt. Jim Lovell, whose life and work inspired millions of people across the decades. Jim’s character and steadfast courage helped our nation reach the Moon and turned a potential tragedy into a success from which we learned an enormous amount. We mourn his passing even as we celebrate his achievements,“ acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy said in a statement.

Lovell was an experienced astronaut before the near-catastrophic Apollo 13 spaceflight and was part of the crew of Gemini 7, Gemini 12 and Apollo 8, making him one of the space agency’s most traveled astronauts in NASA’s first 10 years, the AP reported.

As part of Apollo 8, he, along with Frank Borman and William Anders, left Earth’s orbit and circled the moon. The photo of the Earth from the moon was the first such image.

“What I keep imagining is if I am some lonely traveler from another planet, what I would think about the Earth at this altitude, whether I think it would be inhabited or not,” he said of the view from space, according to AP.

They also read from the Book of Genesis, which tells of the creation of Earth.

“And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night,” Lovell read, according to The New York Times. “And the evening and the morning were the first day.”

His next flight, on Apollo 13, would have had him walk on the moon, but when the oxygen tank exploded, that ended that dream for Lovell.

Lovell said the often misquoted phrase, “Ah, Houston, we’ve had a problem here. We’ve had a Main B Bus Undervolt,” after his crewmate and command module pilot John “Jack” Swigert alerted mission control, “Okay, Houston, we’ve had a problem here,” according to NASA.

Tom Hanks, who played Lovell, in the film “Apollo 13″ said the misquote, “Houston, we have a problem,” The New York Times reported.

The real Lovell appeared in the film, shaking Hanks’ hand once the crew came back to Earth.

The three men — Lovell, Swigert and Fred Haise — spent nearly four days cramped in the lunar module, trying to reengineer a device to help them breathe and return home, the Times reported.

‘’The thing that I want most people to remember is (that) in some sense it was very much of a success,’' Lovell said in 1994. ‘’Not that we accomplished anything, but a success in that we demonstrated the capability of (NASA) personnel.’'

Until Skylab, Lovell held the record for longest time in space, clocking 715 hours, 4 minutes and 57 seconds, the AP reported.

He was awarded the Congressional Space Medal of Honor in 1995 and when then-President Bill Clinton gave him the honor, he told Lovell, “While you may have lost the moon ... you gained something that is far more important perhaps: the abiding respect and gratitude of the American people.”

Lovell was born in 1928 in Cleveland and attended the U.S. Naval Academy. He married his wife, Marilyn, on the same day he graduated from the academy in 1962. He was a test pilot at the Navy Test Center in Patuxent River, Maryland, when he was selected to become an astronaut in 1962.

He was an author, writing “Lost Moon” with Jeff Kluger in 1994, which was what the film “Apollo 13″ was based on.

He and his family had run a restaurant outside of Chicago, a business which had closed, the AP reported.

Lovell died Aug. 7 in Lake Forest, Illinois, the AP reported.

His cause of death was not immediately released, CNN reported.

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