Overview

• NASA confirmed that Lovell died on August 7 at his home in Lake Forest, Illinois, at the age of 97
• He commanded Apollo 13 in April 1970 and guided his crew to safety after a service-module oxygen tank explosion en route to the Moon
• In December 1968, Lovell flew as command module pilot on Apollo 8, becoming part of the first crewed spacecraft to orbit the Moon
• Across four missions—Gemini 7, Gemini 12, Apollo 8 and Apollo 13—he accumulated more than 715 hours in space, a record that stood until the Skylab era
• He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Space Medal of Honor for his pioneering contributions to human spaceflight