My older son, Craig, my four-year-old grandson, Hunter, and I heard Apollo astronaut and retired U.S. Air Force Col. Al Worden talk about his experiences as the command module pilot on Apollo 15 and reflect on Apollo 11 when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon July 20, 1969. It's hard to believe it's been 50 years!Worden called Neil Armstrong the second Charles Lindbergh. Lindbergh, in 1927, became the first man to fly an airplane across the Atlantic Ocean. Aviation still was new, and flying nonstop across the ocean was dangerous. Worden also said of Armstrong, "He was the consummate pilot who never lost his cool." Armstrong's confidence was important when a glitch required him to land the module on the moon manually with just 17 seconds of fuel left! Worden said of the other Apollo 11 astronauts, "Mike Collins was a test pilot extraordinaire" and Buzz Aldrin, who wrote his doctoral thesis at MIT on rendezvous and docking was the "brains."
Worden was the first man to perform a deep-space extra-vehicular activity, or space walk, just outside lunar orbit, and he made 75 solo revolutions around the moon while his colleagues, David Scott and James Irwin, performed science experiments on the lunar surface. He said he saw the earth rise 75 times and wished everyone could see the earth from that perspective. 
He also talked tonight about how each NASA mission built upon the previous missions and each became more scientifically focused. Apollo 15, which launched July 26, 1971, and returned to earth August 7, 1971, was the first to utilize the Lunar Roving Vehicle. The mission was notable for several other reasons, including the astronauts spent more than 18 hours on the moon, as opposed to a few hours for the astronauts aboard Apollo 11; the spacecraft was the heaviest object to ever lift off the ground at nearly 7 million pounds; the lunar module landed 27 degrees north of the moon's equator at Hadley Rille (the equatorial pull was unknown, so that was an extra risk); the landing was at an angle of 26 degrees, the steepest approach of any of the earlier Apollo missions, and it had to cross the Apennine Range, one of the highest points on the moon; and August 5, Worden climbed out of the command module to retrieve film cassettes (digital photography didn't exist then) from the service module. He said the only picture of that historic event is of his butt climbing out of the command module. (He thinks that was by design!) However, an artist created a painting to commemorate the space walk!
Worden's reflections about the Apollo 15 patch elicited a few cheers from the women in the audience when he mentioned Emilio Pucci, a fashion designer famous for bold colors and kaleidoscopic prints. Worden said Pucci studied agricultural engineering at the University of Georgia and was a bomber pilot during World War II before becoming a fashion icon. Because a friend of a friend of a friend knew Pucci, he designed the stylized three bird motif for the Apollo 15 patch. However, he used blues and greens, which the crew changed to the patriotic red, white, and blue.NASA didn't want to use Roman numerals on the patches, but the crew hid them in plain site. Do you see them? Look between the red and blue wings and you will see the stylized craters!
I am sure Hunter will not remember tonight's presentation, nor do I think my son realizes the significance it holds for me. I am thrilled to have heard Col. Worden's presentation and to have had the opportunity to say hello and shake his hand. I am grateful.
I missed his radio interview this morning. If you'd like to listen, visit the link below!
https://obxtoday.com/things-to-do/astronaut-al-worden-to-share-unique-insight-on-apollo-11-this-thursday-in-corolla/
#Apollo15
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