https://www.npr.org/2021/04/28/509599284/forgotten-astronaut-michael-collins-dies

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Apollo 11 Astronaut Michael Collins Dies Collins was the crew member
who stayed in orbit on the Apollo 11 command module while Neil
Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon. Later he oversaw
building of the National Air and Space Museum.
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Apollo 11 Astronaut Michael Collins Dies

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Apollo 11 Astronaut Michael Collins Dies 3:34

Space

Apollo 11 Astronaut Michael Collins Dies

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April 28, 202112:12 PM ET
Heard on All Things Considered
Russell Lewis

Russell Lewis

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Apollo 11 Astronaut Michael Collins Dies

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[ap_6263686]
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Apollo 11 astronaut Michael Collins (left) with Apollo 16 astronaut
Charles Duke at a 2014 event in Cambridge, Mass. Steven Senne/AP hide
caption

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Steven Senne/AP

Apollo 11 astronaut Michael Collins (left) with Apollo 16 astronaut
Charles Duke at a 2014 event in Cambridge, Mass.

Steven Senne/AP

An astronaut who flew on one of the most famous space missions of all
time has died. Michael Collins, 90, was part of the three-member crew
on Apollo 11, the first lunar landing mission in 1969. Unlike Neil
Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, he never walked on the moon. Collins
stayed behind and piloted the command module as it circled above.
Because of that, Collins is often called the "forgotten astronaut."

Collins had been battling cancer. A statement released by his family
said, "He spent his final days peacefully, with his family by his
side. Mike always faced the challenges of life with grace and
humility, and faced this, his final challenge in the same way."

NASA Administrator Steve Jurczyk said the nation lost a true pioneer.
"NASA mourns the loss of this accomplished pilot and astronaut, a
friend of all who seek to push the envelope of human potential,"
Jurczyk said in a statement. "Whether his work was behind the scenes
or on full view, his legacy will always be as one of the leaders who
took America's first steps into the cosmos. And his spirit will go
with us as we venture toward farther horizons."

[ap_6581734]
Enlarge this image

In 1969, President Richard Nixon greets the Apollo 11 astronauts in
quarantine after their mission to the moon. The Apollo 11 crew
members (from left) are Neil Armstrong, Collins and Buzz Aldrin. AP 
hide caption

toggle caption
AP

In 1969, President Richard Nixon greets the Apollo 11 astronauts in
quarantine after their mission to the moon. The Apollo 11 crew
members (from left) are Neil Armstrong, Collins and Buzz Aldrin.

AP

When Armstrong and Aldrin landed on the moon, and Armstrong uttered
the famous phrase, "Houston, Tranquility Base here, the Eagle has
landed," Collins was in orbit, 60 miles above, just as busy, and just
as excited, telling the team back in Houston he was listening to
communications with his comrades, and it was "fantastic."

Aldrin and Armstrong were on the lunar surface just under 22 hours.
The world was transfixed, seeing them bunny-hop along, take pictures
and collect lunar samples during a single, short moonwalk. All the
while, Collins circled the moon, looking down at the barren lunar
landscape and peering back at the Earth. "The thing I remember most
is the view of planet Earth from a great distance," he said later.
"Tiny. Very shiny. Blue and white. Bright. Beautiful. Serene and
fragile."

"He was the keystone of the mission"

As he orbited, he could talk to controllers half the time, but when
he was on the back side of the moon, he was completely cut off. It
was because of this part of the mission that some dubbed him the
loneliest man in humanity. As he recalled in a 2016 NPR interview, he
didn't think of it that way. He said, "The fact that I was ... out of
communications, rather than that being a fear, that was a joy because
I got Mission Control to shut up for a little while. Every once in a
while."

"It's a shame that when people are asked, 'Can you name the Apollo 11
crew?' Mike Collins is normally the name that doesn't come to mind,"
said Francis French, space historian and author of many books on the
space program. "Because in many ways he was the keystone of the
mission. He was the one who really knew how to fly the spacecraft
solo (the only person who flew a spacecraft solo in the entire
mission) and the only one who could get all three of them home."

[gettyimage]
Enlarge this image

Collins studies the flight plan during simulation training at the
Kennedy Space Center before the scheduled Apollo 11 mission. Bettmann
Archive/Getty Images hide caption

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Bettmann Archive/Getty Images

Collins studies the flight plan during simulation training at the
Kennedy Space Center before the scheduled Apollo 11 mission.

Bettmann Archive/Getty Images

"And if something went wrong with the lunar lander that Neil
Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were in," French noted, "Michael Collins
had the engine that could try to rendezvous with somewhere around the
moon and rescue them."

Life before space

Mike Collins was born in 1930 in Rome, where his dad was a major
general in the U.S. Army. Service and duty were a part of Collins his
whole life. He graduated from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point
and later joined the Air Force and became a test pilot.

NASA chose him as an astronaut in 1963, and his first flight was
aboard Gemini 10. On that mission, he became the fourth human to
conduct a spacewalk.

As a boy, Collins dreamed of going to space. "I used to joke that
NASA sent me to the wrong place, to the moon," he said, "because I
think Mars is a more interesting place. It's a place I always read
about as a child."

[ap_9907200]
Enlarge this image

Collins receives an award for aviation from Vice President Al Gore in
1999 at a ceremony at the National Air and Space Museum. Fellow
Apollo 11 astronauts Armstrong (left) and Aldrin also were honored at
the event marking the 30th anniversary of the first moon landing.
Doug Mills/AP hide caption

toggle caption
Doug Mills/AP

Collins receives an award for aviation from Vice President Al Gore in
1999 at a ceremony at the National Air and Space Museum. Fellow
Apollo 11 astronauts Armstrong (left) and Aldrin also were honored at
the event marking the 30th anniversary of the first moon landing.

Doug Mills/AP

Life after space

Mars was also a place he wrote about as an adult. Collins authored
several books, and one, Carrying the Fire, is considered the best of
all the astronaut autobiographies.

Apollo 11 was his final trip to space, and he never dwelled on
missing a chance to step on the moon. "As an astronaut I always
thought I had the best job in the world, and I still think that," he
said, "but for me when it was over it was over."

Still, he said, he would look up and see the moon and think, " 'Oh my
God! I've been there!' I was up there, you see. Kind of takes me by
surprise despite all these years."

He called his time with NASA "a chapter in my life -- the shiniest
best chapter in my life -- but not the only one."

Collins achieved the rank of major general. He left NASA in 1970 to
join the State Department. Later he became director of the
Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington, overseeing
its construction and opening in 1976.

In his later years, Collins didn't slow down. He competed in
triathlons, loved fishing and even took up painting.

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