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Jim Lovell, Apollo 13 commander, has died
- rbanffy 1y agoHouston, I have a problem with my eyes.
- cushychicken 1y agoUnrestrained onions in command module.
- Rooster61 1y agoAn utter shame that he never got a chance to actually touch down on the moon. IMO, he, and everyone involved with Apollo 13 after it left the ground, truly represent the peak of NASA personnel. Listening to the calm, cool manner in which Jim and everyone else conducted themselves with while their spacecraft was literally falling apart around them give me chills. Godspeed sir
- pjmorris 1y ago> IMO, he, and everyone involved with Apollo 13 after it left the ground, truly represent the peak of NASA personnel. Agreed. One of the best books I've read on Apollo was 'Apollo: Race to the Moon', by Murray and Cox. It spends a lot of time on the engineering and management challenges behind what they accomplished then. One of the book's best chapters was on the enormous team(s) on the ground behind the troubleshooting and problem-solving for Apollo 13.
- GlennFarrant 1y agoMy favourite book of all time. It also covers how audacious Apollo 8 was....the other Lovell mission. Blue skies and tailwinds Capt Lovell.
- seabass-labrax 1y ago> cool manner in which Jim and everyone else conducted themselves I find it interesting that the argument briefly depicted in the 1995 film was added for dramatic effect. The real crew didn't even raise their voices! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_13_(film)#Technical_and_historical_accuracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_13_(film)#Technical_and...
- actinium226 1y agoHe came to speak at a small awards ceremony at my university. He came into the room and said "sorry, I know you were all expecting Tom Hanks!" Really seemed like a great guy, shame to hear about his passing.
- bunderbunder 1y agoHe spoke at my school, too, and I got a chance to shake his hand. It was only a brief personal encounter, but I also came away with the impression that he must be one of the kindest people walking around on this rock.
- potato3732842 1y agoMovies about men who survived despite incredibly long odds will never be the same once Tom Hanks dies.
- mhh__ 1y ago"We" [0] need to get back up there before they're all gone. [0] I say "We" but I'm not American...
- bwb 1y agoHuman works too, or earthling :)
- ColinWright 1y agoI was lucky enough to have met and spent some time with Jim Lovell. An absolute gentleman, and it was a joy to have been in his company. Ad Astra ...
- richardwhiuk 1y agoPer aspera
- sylens 1y agoFor an astronaut, it has to be a triumph to die of old age or natural causes. Doubly so for the crew of Apollo 13.
- rjsw 1y agoMultiply that by having also been a Naval Aviator in early jet aircraft then a test pilot.
- zaken 1y agoI thought it was interesting that astronauts live longer than the general population: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20240001373/downloads/IWS_Prelich_Final.pdf https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20240001373/downloads/IW...
- TMWNN 1y agoLovell, as Pilot, flew with Frank Borman as Command Pilot on Gemini 7. They spent two very unpleasant weeks in space.[1] Borman commanded Apollo 8, the first manned flight to the moon, again with Lovell. However, Lovell had by then commanded Gemini 12. So the odd situation resulted in which the person with more spaceflight experience was not commander.[2] Lovell has another distinction besides the whole "survived almost certain death in space on Apollo 13" thing: He is the only one of the three Apollo 8 crewmen to have not become a Fortune 500 CEO. (Frank Borman ran Eastern Airlines, and Bill Anders ran General Dynamics.) [1] TIL that NASA's Gemini 7 space mission lasted for 14 days. After rendezvousing with Gemini 6 on the 11th day, the two astronauts had nothing to do other than read books in the very cramped cockpit. Frank Borman, the commander, said that the last three days were "bad".<https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1ccpszs/til_that_nasas_gemini_7_space_mission_lasted_for/ https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1ccpszs/til_...> [2] This has happened a few more times, including the current Crew-11 to ISS, in which a rookie is commander while the other three have all flown in space before
- lenerdenator 1y agoThere should be a national day of mourning. There won't be, but there should be.
- thatwasunusual 1y agoRemember that Trump doesn't like losers, so because of that "logic" Lovell shouldn't be mourned or remembered.
- FabHK 1y agoTrivia: Jim Lovell is the only person to fly to the moon twice without landing on it (scheduled "test flight" on Apollo 8, unscheduled emergency on Apollo 13). 12 people flew to the moon without landing on it, now only 1 is still alive (Fred Haise). 12 people walked on the moon, 4 are still alive (Buzz Aldrin, David Scott, Charles Duke, Harrison Schmitt). (Conclusion: walking on the moon is healthy?)
- dyauspitr 1y agoConclusion: the people selected to walk on the moon were fit and healthy
- WJW 1y agoI don't doubt that the people selected to walk on the moon were indeed fit and healthy, but it seems like a stretch to think that the people who flew on the earlier Apollo missions were selected to less stringent criteria. The selection effect should be just as strong for the people who "merely" got to fly around the moon. So out of two sets of people selected for being healthy, one group seems to be much more alive than the other. (Also yes obviously the sample size is too low to draw meaningful conclusions)
- amalcon 1y agoIf anything, it would be even more so. If a person on the moon had a medical emergency, this would be a serious problem but there's another person there to help and/or fly the lander back to the capsule. If the person in the capsule had a medical emergency, it's hard to see how any of the crew survive. More likely though, as you suggest, the same astronomical standards (pun intended) applied to all crew members.
- garaetjjte 1y ago>If the person in the capsule had a medical emergency, it's hard to see how any of the crew survive. They could spacewalk and open CM hatch from the outside. Wrench for opening the hatch was stored in the lunar module.
- unethical_ban 1y agoProbably one of the more famous astronauts in pop culture given the movie Apollo 13. As someone who grew up near NASA that is one of my favorite films. I recommend "A Man on the Moon" for anyone interested in that era. Rest in Peace! Time to read up on him again.
- hinkley 1y agoThat movie turned 30 about 5 weeks ago.
- seansmccullough 1y agoThat makes me feel really old.
- davidw 1y agoI know some of the space race stuff was driven by cold war politics, but I think it was still pretty cool. Big, difficult goals can be inspiring.
- creativenolo 1y ago>Big, difficult goals can be inspiring. So true. > Some of the space race was driven by Cold War politics. Is it fairer to say, initiated by? Listen to Michael Collins speak on the first episode of “13 Minutes to the Moon.” “We did it.” The “we” being humanity, not nationalism. Yes, it started with rivalry, but it lifted humanity’s ceiling. There is a lot wrong with the Apollo story (race, gender), but these issues were a symptom of the time, less a cause. These issues were reckoning against a legacy. The goal was to show superiority, not leverage it. I wish this was the case for a nation capable of going to the moon today. Instead of leverage against shared and common issues, the goal was to better.
- d00mB0t 1y ago"Houston, we have a problem" RIP Jim Lovell.
- xatax 1y agoSince we're talking about the actual astronaut, not the movie, I feel I should point out Swigert and Lovell both say "Houston, we've had a problem", not have.
- alex1138 1y agoOnly to have the Apollo 13 movie unnecessarily invent a fake argument in which Haise accuses Swigert of screwing up the oxygen tank stir Decent movie, but that scene ruins it
- Metacelsus 1y agoRIP to one of the greats. The Astronaut Scholarship Foundation wrote up a great tribute: https://www.astronautscholarship.org/assets/2025-asf-lovell-press-release.pdf?blm_aid=41547 https://www.astronautscholarship.org/assets/2025-asf-lovell-...
- jackcviers3 1y agoA true inspiration
- ashton314 1y agoI don't get that emotional when watching movies. I cried a little when the parachutes opened in Apollo 13. As a kid I had a book detailing hundreds of space missions—mostly probes, obviously—but my favorite mission to read about was Apollo 13. Just incredible. Maybe when Jim got to heaven, the first place the angels took him to was where he would have landed on the moon.
- Sharlin 1y ago> I cried a little when the parachutes opened in Apollo 13. Thanks in no small part to Horner's score, at least in my case.
- trothamel 1y agoThat, plus the way the scene is set, you cut to the family not knowing if the astronauts survived. And then the movie cuts out about 4 minutes of waiting between when Apollo 13 regains contact, and when the main chutes are deployed and unreefed - when things seem 100% safe, and everyone starts cheering. It's a really good decision in a movie that made a lot of them, as it made the relief hit all at once. And then you see Jim Lovell's cameo as the captain of the Iwo Jima, just to cap the movie off.
- mrexroad 1y agoI’m not crying, you’re crying!
- alex1138 1y agoFirst of all that remark is incredibly touching, thank you for that Apollo 14 (after they diagnosed the 13 issues and beefed up the spacecraft a bit with a few redundancies) actually did land where 13 was supposed to
- cushychicken 1y agoHomeboy deserved someone to weep for him at least a little bit. Not so much the fact that he was gone - the fact that he was here. Jim Lovell made us all better just for existing.
- dielotr 1y agoAs a member of Apollo 13, he flew farther from Earth than any other human being ever has. He was literally closer to God and the Heavens than anyone else before or since. RIP and ad astra to a great American
- addaon 1y ago> He was literally closer to God If you subscribe to a religion that not only assigns a physical known location to God, but puts that location at a significant distance away from humanity either in a specific direction, or in a general “anywhere except where those people are” sense. Is that a common belief structure?
- chronogram 1y agoI think it is common. In that religion heaven is in the clouds above, and someone going very high up into the clouds but not reaching it then got closer than others did.
- addaon 1y agoSo sort of the projective real line?
- thatwasunusual 1y ago> He was literally closer to God and the Heavens than anyone else before or since. How so?
- WalterBright 1y agoI'd fly anywhere with Jim Lovell.
- fsckboy 1y ago[flagged]
- zamadatix 1y agoRandall started out at NASA before doing XKCD full time.
- fsckboy 1y agoElon started SpaceX for this specific purpose. I'm not aware that NASA has ever had that as a goal. Every fan of sci-fi has similar fantasies, nobody owns it. furthermore, I provided an actual link to the xkcd, and quoted the hover-caption. I think my comment made sense, and contributed, and I think Elon has contributed, and I was downvoted by you-know-exactly-who, the triggerypuffs, and this comment will probably be downvoted for coming even close to mentioning it, the free speech brigade will be here to let us know what is free and what is restricted.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- thejazzman 1y agoelon claimed he started spacex for... there, fixed that little glitch for ya! and if you're skeptical, read his first biography, where he enumerated numerous things he'd never ever do -- specifically, using spacex for anything other than mars, explicitly he says the government would have to take it from him.
- zamadatix 1y ago> I'm not aware that NASA has ever had that as a goal. The only thing on the graph is NASA not making the sensible economic decision by sending people to the moon (starting 2 years before Elon was born) and the guy went to work at NASA while still in college, yet he still "went full Elon" despite: > Every fan of sci-fi has similar fantasies, nobody owns it. It's clear you really want to talk about Elon instead, just not why. Well, at least until you start saying things like "triggerypuffs"... at which point why bother arguing good faith?
- satisfice 1y ago[flagged]
- wyldfire 1y agoI met Captain Lovell at his restaurant in Illinois around 2003 or so. He was a happy man, friendly greetings for all his guests.
- accrual 1y agoGodspeed, Captain Lovell. o7
- cenriqueortiz 1y agoMy son and I met him once. He was a very down to Earth, kind person. RIP. QEPD.
- assimpleaspossi 1y agoIn the movie "Apollo 13", when the astronauts board the Navy ship after being recovered at sea, Lovell, played by Tom Hanks, is greeted by and shakes the hand of the captain of the ship. The captain was played by Jim Lovell.
- Syzygies 1y agoAnd David Scott, commander of Apollo 15, was the technical consultant. As Ron Howard explained this to me, he sees reality as more interesting and detailed than any fiction. No one would grasp the details were correct, but he felt they would contribute an irreplaceable texture to the film. I became the math consultant for A Beautiful Mind in part because I was such an Apollo 13 buff. In my first call with Todd Hallowell, the executive producer, we spent an hour's aside discussing Apollo 13. This actually was part of the interview: Making a movie is intensely boring unless you're really engaged, and I demonstrated the required interest in detail.
- lagrange77 1y ago> I became the math consultant for A Beautiful Mind in part because I was such an Apollo 13 buff. Cool, awesome job, as far as i can tell as a fan of the movie! So you did what was best for yourself... and the group.
- ahi 1y agoThe movie was released 25 years after the incident. It has been 30 years since the movie was released.
- guender 1y ago[dead]
- LastV8 1y agoWhat is really amazing is that three astronauts flew to the Moon TWICE! Unfortunately Jim Lovell was unlucky and only orbited because after Apollo 8, 13 didn't make it, as we know. John Young and Gene Cernan orbited, and landed.
- initramfs 1y agohasn't even reached the top of Google News. The world is completely consumed in its own mess.
- ChicagoDave 1y agoI attended his high school. The foyer had a panoramic display of the Apollo 13 story. He spoke at our 1982 graduation.
- SulphurCrested 1y agoI highly recommend his book with Jeffrey Kluger, “Apollo 13”, originally published as “Lost Moon” in 1994.
- utopcell 1y agoGodspeed.
- adidoit 1y agoI was lucky enough to hear him tell the story of Apollo 13 when I was at Purdue University. In my second year, he came to the Electrical Engineering lecture hall and told the story of Apollo 13 to a packed crowd, standing room. I believe it was during the events of the opening of Armstrong Hall in 2007 Unfortunately no one had smartphones then and I doubt it was recorded. I barely remember the details but I still remember the feeling of watching someone deeply confident and caring who gave so much credit to the broader team he worked with. He remembered all the details including specific equipment and model numbers of switches. He spoke in that confident tone a lot of astronauts have but somehow still very humble and empathetic and answered so many questions. He was 70+ at the time I guess so energetic he looked 40. I honestly think this was the one time I met a "hero" who more than lived up to the hype. Rest in Peace Commander Lovell.
- vermontdevil 1y agoOne strange aspect about Apollo 8 is that all three astronauts have passed away on the 7th day of the month. Frank Borman Nov 7, 2023 William Anders June 7, 2024 James Lovell Aug 7, 2025
- in_cahoots 1y agoThey were also the only Apollo crew not to have a divorce amongst them. It's an interesting contrast to the happy, proud, and thrilled 'All-American' stereotype they and their wives were presented as.
- asdefghyk 1y agoI recall the intense frequent media reports about this event (Apollo 13 accident and return to earth ) at the time. We had a small transistor radio and the daily newspaper at our remotish farm in Australia. (Not many people had BW tv at the time)
- cobbaut 1y agoObligatory xkcd: https://xkcd.com/893/ https://xkcd.com/893/
- dostick 1y agoNot about Lovell, but still relevant https://youtube.com/shorts/SorOtTc69lI https://youtube.com/shorts/SorOtTc69lI
- AceyMan 1y agoThis seemed black bar worthy, but it's Day 2 and not yet .