Alfred Worden

In 1963, Worden put his name in for selection to NASA's third group of astronauts but was told that though NASA was interested in him even without test pilot experience, he was ruled out by his pending orders to Farnborough, with which the agency could not interfere. Worden thought he would be beyond NASA's age limit for new astronauts when next free to consider such a career option, and so believed he would never be an astronaut.[20]

The Group 5 astronauts. Worden stands third from right.

NASA's recruitment for its fifth group of astronauts took place in 1965, at the same time the Air Force was seeking to recruit for its program, the Manned Orbiting Laboratory, with qualified pilots in the Air Force free to apply for either or both. Believing, as proved correct, that the Air Force program would never get off the ground, Worden chose to apply only to NASA, which he did in September 1965. Worden wrote in his first book of memoirs that "professionally, I figured it couldn't get any better than that. Even being a test pilot couldn't compare with being an astronaut and making a spaceflight."[21] Under the selection criteria, candidates had to be born on or after December 1, 1929, raising the age limit from 34 to 36.[22] Worden, aged 34 when selected, was one of the 19 candidates chosen by NASA in April 1966, together with his ARPS classmates Stuart Roosa and Charles Duke; four others were previous graduates.[23]

Having been urged by NASA superiors to have plenty of astronauts available for the many hoped-for Apollo and Apollo Applications missions, Director of Flight Crew Operations Deke Slayton, the astronauts' supervisor, hired all the Group 5 candidates he considered qualified. Budget cuts and the diversion of funds to other programs meant there would be relatively few flights, and Worden perceived some resentment at the new intake from more senior astronauts as the competition for spots on Apollo missions intensified.[24][25]

On October 3, 1966, Chief Astronaut Alan Shepard assigned Worden and four other Group 5 selectees, Ken Mattingly, Jack Swigert, Ronald Evans and Vance Brand, to the astronaut team dealing with the Block II command module (CM), headed by Pete Conrad.[26] The Block I command modules were intended only for Apollo's initial Earth-orbit flights, and in fact never flew in space on a crewed mission; the Block II modules would go to lunar orbit.[27] The following month, Worden was assigned as part of the support crew for the second crewed Apollo mission, along with Fred Haise and Edgar Mitchell. Apollo support crews were to do the things that the prime and backup crews did not have time for. Worden took the assignment as an indication that NASA management, including Slayton, was pleased with him.[28]

Worden was at North American Aviation's plant in Downey, California, where the Block II command module was being built, on January 27, 1967, when he received an urgent phone call from Slayton, informing him that all three Apollo 1 astronauts had been killed in a fire at the launch pad, where a test was under way. Worden informed the other astronauts on-site and they flew back to Houston. He was especially saddened by the fact that the three accomplished pilots who were to make up the first Apollo space crew died on the ground, rather than flying. During the complete safety review that followed, Worden spent much of his time in Downey working on the Block II CM, seeking (with other CM specialists such as Swigert) to remove potential combustibles and other hazards. After the pause, he remained on the support crew for the second Apollo mission, which was to include testing of the CM and Lunar Module (LM) in Earth orbit.[29][30]

This mission was initially designated Apollo 8.[31] There were delays in the development of the LM and in August 1968, NASA official George Low proposed that if Apollo 7 in October went well, Apollo 8 should go to lunar orbit without a LM, so as not to hold up the program. The Earth-orbit test would become Apollo 9.[32] The crew who had been scheduled for Apollo 8, led by Jim McDivitt, became the Apollo 9 crew,[33] and Worden became part of that mission's support crew along with Mitchell and Jack Lousma.[34]

Worden was named as backup command module pilot (CMP) for the Apollo 12 flight.[34][35] Apollo 9's CMP had been David Scott,[34] who became, by the normal rotation of crews instituted by Slayton, the backup commander of Apollo 12 and the prospective commander of Apollo 15, with Worden likely to be the CMP of Apollo 15's prime crew. Jim Irwin was named backup lunar module pilot (LMP) for Apollo 12, with similar prospects of flying on Apollo 15. Slayton, in his memoirs, mentioned that Worden had been on the support crew for Apollo 9, and deemed him a "logical choice".[36] Worden wrote in his own autobiography that he and Irwin had learned of their selection for Apollo 12 at a meeting in Scott's office.[37]

The Corvettes owned by Worden (left) and Scott, as photographed in 2019

As Apollo 12's backup command module pilot, Worden forged a close, lifelong friendship with the prime crew's CMP, Dick Gordon, with whom he trained. Worden remembered, "Dick was my buddy. We flew together and worked together for a year and a half when he was training for Apollo 12 and I was his backup. We just went everywhere together. We worked really hard but it was also a lot of fun."[38] Gordon and Worden learned navigational techniques for space so that if communications with Mission Control failed, the CMP could bring the craft home.[39] Worden remembered that the Apollo 12 prime crew, led by Pete Conrad, had a close bond and drove matching black and gold Chevrolet Corvettes at Kennedy Space Center (KSC). In reaction, the backup crew secured a red one for Irwin, white for Worden, and a blue car for Scott, both emphasizing their individuality within the crew and making them less conspicuous at times when they did not want to be recognized as astronauts, especially since the three cars were rarely seen together.[lower-alpha 1][40]

Worden in the command module during training

Scott, Worden, and Irwin were publicly named as the crew of Apollo 15 on March 26, 1970.[41] Apollo 15 was originally scheduled to be an H mission, with a limited stay of 33 hours on the Moon and two moonwalks, but the cancellation of two Apollo missions in mid-1970 meant the flight would be a J mission, with three moonwalks during its three-day stay, the first Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV),[42] and in the service module (SM) a suite of scientific instruments to probe the Moon. It was Worden's job, as his crewmates walked on the Moon, to operate these devices. For the first time, observations from lunar orbit were made a formal mission objective, and, like the CMPs of Apollo 13 and Apollo 14, Worden worked with geologist Farouk El-Baz during training, learning to interpret what he saw as he flew over the mountains and deserts of the western United States.[43] Worden found El-Baz to be an enjoyable and inspiring teacher.[44] He also accompanied his crewmates on geology training which took them to places where they walked over terrain resembling the Moon's, including sites in Hawaii, Mexico, and Iceland. He trained for the possibility he might have to return without Scott and Irwin or rescue them if the LM launched into the wrong orbit.[45] When he was not busy with that or other training, Worden spent much of his time at North American Rockwell's facilities at Downey, supervising the construction and testing of Apollo 15's command and service module (CSM).[46]

Before leaving on his mission, Worden appeared on the children's television show Mister Rogers' Neighborhood. He felt NASA needed to do more to engage children, members of a generation whose support would one day be necessary for the space program. Fred Rogers was planning to do shows on parents going away on trips, and felt Worden's appearance would mesh well with that. Worden appeared on the show before going to the Moon and answered several children's questions: he wrote down some others and took them with him on the spacecraft, promising to think about them on the trip, and after the mission, appeared again on the program to answer them.[47]

Apollo 15 took off on its lunar journey from KSC on July 26, 1971.[48] Once trans-lunar injection had been achieved, placing the spacecraft on a trajectory towards the Moon, explosive cords separated the CSM, Endeavour, from the booster as Worden operated the CSM's thrusters to push it away. Worden then maneuvered the CSM to dock with the LM, Falcon, which was mounted on the end of the S-IVB (the booster that had supplied the thrust for TLI), and the combined craft was then separated from the S-IVB by explosives.[49]

After the mission arrived in lunar orbit, Scott and Irwin entered Falcon while Worden remained in Endeavour. When the two craft failed to separate to allow Falcon and its crew to prepare for the Moon landing, Worden went into the docking tunnel and reconnected a loose umbilical, fixing the problem.[50][51] Worden, in Endeavour, was able to listen as Scott and Irwin descended toward and landed on the Moon, but was unable to spot Falcon until a later orbit, though he passed over the targeted site at the moment of planned landing.[52] He had executed a burn of the CSM's main engine, the Service Propulsion System, to send Endeavour from the lower orbit in which the two craft separated, to an orbit of 65.2 nautical miles (120.8 km; 75.0 mi) by 54.8 nautical miles (101.5 km; 63.1 mi) in preparation for his scientific work.[51]

Worden began what amounted to a separate mission from his crewmates, with a separate CAPCOM and mission controllers. His main tasks while alone in lunar orbit were photography, and operating the instruments in the SIM bay.[54] Filling previously unused space in the service module, the SIM bay contained a gamma-ray spectrometer, mounted on the end of a boom, an X-ray spectrometer and a laser altimeter, which failed part way through the mission. A stellar camera and a metric camera together comprised the mapping camera, which was complemented by a panoramic camera, derived from the long-classified Corona spy technology. Also present were an alpha particle spectrometer, which could be used to detect evidence of lunar volcanism, and a mass spectrometer, also on a boom in the hope it would be unaffected by contamination from the ship.[55] He supplemented the photographs with verbal descriptions; Endeavour's inclined orbit caused it to pass over features never seen before in detail as Worden watched.[56] Each time Endeavour's orbit passed from the far side of the Moon to a view of the Earth and renewed communications with Mission Control, Worden greeted it with the words, "Hello, Earth. Greetings from Endeavour", expressed in different languages. Worden and El-Baz had come up with the idea, and had collaborated on translations.[57]

Busy as he was, he still had time to savor the experience.[58] Knowing he was unlikely to come back to the Moon, Worden was determined to absorb the entire experience. He did not need all the rest periods for sleep, and spent part of that time in contemplation of what was outside his craft, and what it all meant. Through Endeavour's windows, he watched the Moon, the Earth, and the stars – he could see many more stars, and more intensely, than Earthbound observers. He concluded it was naive to believe Earth had the only life in the universe, and he wondered if space exploration was part of humanity's survival instinct to avoid being trapped in a single solar system.[59]

Worden has been listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the "most isolated human being" during his time alone in Endeavour. Orbiting the Moon alone, he was at his greatest distance from Scott and Irwin in Falcon, 2,235 miles (3,597 km) away from any other human beings.[60] He later stated he enjoyed his "three wonderful days in a spacecraft all by myself", and that he was used to being alone as a fighter pilot.[8][61] Worden remembered, "On the back side of the Moon, I didn't even have to talk to Houston and that was the best part of the flight."[61]

Worden performing the first deep-space EVA during Apollo 15's homeward journey (1971)

As Falcon took off from the Moon, Worden played a recording of the Air Force Song ("Off we go, into the wild blue yonder"), intending it to be heard only in Mission Control; somewhat to his chagrin, it was relayed to the LM, to the annoyance of Scott. Worden piloted the CSM as Scott maneuvered the LM, bringing them together in a direct rendezvous, on the first lunar orbit, the second time a first-orbit rendezvous had been accomplished (after Apollo 14).[62]

Endeavour completed 74 lunar orbits prior to trans-Earth injection (TEI), the burn to take the astronauts home.[63] On the way back to Earth, Worden did a spacewalk to retrieve film from the spacecraft's cameras.[64] He took 38 minutes in extravehicular activity (EVA) outside Endeavour to accomplish this, three times venturing from outside the hatch to the exterior of the SIM bay of the SM. In retrieving the film cassettes from the panoramic and mapping cameras, Worden performed the first deep-space EVA,[65][66] and reported his personal observations of the general condition of equipment housed there.[1] Worden remains, as of 2020, the record-holder for the EVA performed furthest from Earth.[67] Apollo 15 concluded with a Pacific splashdown and subsequent recovery by the amphibious assault ship USS Okinawa. In completing his flight, Worden logged 295 hours and 11 minutes in space.[1]

The crew had, before the mission, agreed with an acquaintance named Horst Eiermann, who was working on behalf of a West German stamp dealer, Hermann Sieger, to carry 100 postal covers to the Moon in exchange for approximately $7,000 to each astronaut. The astronauts added 100 more for each crew member, though two covers were unaccounted for, leading to a total of 398. These were carried aboard Endeavour prior to launch by Scott in his spacesuit's pocket, were transferred into Falcon and spent three days on the lunar surface inside the lander. After the return, 100 covers were sent to Eiermann in West Germany, and the astronauts received the agreed payments. NASA rules required that personal items carried aboard Apollo flights be manifested for weight and other reasons and approved by Slayton; this was not done.[68] The astronauts stated their intent had been to set up trust funds for their children,[69] and that they intended that the covers not be sold or otherwise publicized until the Apollo program was over and they had left NASA and the Air Force.[70] Astronauts were forbidden by standards of conduct issued in 1967 from using their position for financial gain for themselves or other people.[71]

In addition to the 398 carried by Scott, Worden took 144 covers into space, at the instigation of F. Herrick Herrick, a retired movie director and a stamp collector.[72] These had, as required, been approved by Slayton, who did not ask where Worden had gotten them. After the flight Worden sent 100 of them to Herrick, who sold some.[73] These sales prompted an inquiry to NASA, alerting Slayton, who warned Worden to avoid further commercialization. Worden wrote an angry letter to Herrick, stating that the sales were putting his career at risk.[74]

One of the covers created for Herrick

The 100 covers Scott sent to West Germany were put on sale to Sieger's customers in late 1971 at a price of about $1,500 each. After receiving the agreed payments, the astronauts returned them, and in the end, took no compensation.[75] Slayton heard about the Sieger covers, and he spoke with Worden and Irwin; both referred him to Scott. Slayton, knowing Worden was a stamp collector, became suspicious that he had arranged both deals, and this led to repeated phone calls asking for details.[76] In April 1972, Slayton met with Scott and Worden and learned from them that unauthorized covers had been flown.[77] Worden remembered what hurt the most about that meeting was having disappointed Slayton, a man he greatly admired.[78]

The Apollo 15 crew had been recycled as the backup crew for Apollo 17, the final Apollo mission, as using fully-trained astronauts was easier than training a fresh backup crew who would have no prospect of being the prime crew on a later lunar Apollo mission.[79] But in May 1972, as Worden remembered, Slayton called him while Worden was preparing for geological training, instructing him to clear out his office and go back to the Air Force. Slayton had prevailed on Irwin to retire, letting NASA assign a new backup crew. Worden did not clear out his office but began looking into ways of staying at NASA, even if outside the Astronaut Corps.[80] Slayton said at the time that he had to reduce the number of astronauts, that Irwin and Mitchell were eligible for retirement from the military, and the astronaut he could most easily do without after that was Worden; the postal covers incident had played a part in that determination.[81]

The matter became public in June 1972 and the three astronauts were reprimanded for poor judgment on July 10.[82] Concerned about commercialization of Apollo 15, the Senate Committee on Aeronautical and Space Sciences set a hearing for August 3, 1972; among those who testified were the astronauts, Slayton, NASA Administrator James C. Fletcher and Deputy Administrator George Low.[83] Slayton wrote of the astronauts' testimony, "they came clean and took their lumps but I was still pretty pissed off about it."[84]

This still left Worden trying to find a job at NASA; he testified before the committee that he had been told he could stay if he came to an agreement with whoever he was to work for.[85] He found an ally in Associate Administrator for Manned Space Flight Dale D. Myers, who helped Worden get a position at the Ames Research Center in California.[86] According to Low, NASA was aware that the reprimands made the astronauts essentially unpromotable in the Air Force, which would not have jobs for them worth their abilities, and it was decided that though the crew was removed from flight status, they would be given positions elsewhere in NASA.[87] At Ames, Worden served as a Senior Aerospace Scientist, and from 1973 to 1975, chief of the Systems Study Division. He retired from NASA and the Air Force, with the rank of colonel, in 1975.[1][67]

In his first book of memoirs, Worden took responsibility for making "a decision that fucked up my life completely, utterly, and irreversibly", but felt Scott did not take enough of the blame on himself.[65] In a second book, published posthumously in 2021, Worden expressed his belief that Slayton would not have fired him from the Astronaut Corps if given the chance, but that Slayton's superior, Christopher C. Kraft, wanted him fired.[88] Apollo 10 commander Thomas P. Stafford wrote an epilogue to Worden's first book and stated, "Al should not have his efforts degraded by the decades-old, short-lived publicity surrounding some postal covers carried on board."[65] Worden later stated, "We probably didn't do the smartest thing in the world, but we didn't do anything that was illegal. We didn't do anything that anybody else hadn't done, but the consequences were rather severe to us."[89]