Falling to Earth | Al Worden | Talks at Google

As command module pilot for the Apollo 15 mission to the moon in 1971, Al Worden flew on what is widely regarded as the greatest exploration mission that humans have ever attempted. He spent six days orbiting the moon, including three days completely alone, the most isolated human in existence. During the return from the moon to earth he also conducted the first spacewalk in deep space, becoming the first human ever to see both the entire earth and moon simply by turning his head. The Apollo 15 flight capped an already-impressive career as an astronaut, including important work on the pioneering Apollo 9 and Apollo 12 missions, as well as the perilous flight of Apollo 13.
Nine months after his return from the moon, Worden received a phone call telling him he was fired and ordering him out of his office by the end of the week. He refused to leave.
What happened in those nine months, from being honored with parades and meetings with world leaders to being unceremoniously fired, has been a source of much speculation for four decades. Worden has never before told the full story around the dramatic events that shook NASA and ended his spaceflight career. Readers will learn them here for the first time, along with the exhilarating account of what it is like to journey to the moon and back. It's an unprecedentedly candid account of what it was like to be an Apollo astronaut, with all its glory but also its pitfalls.

[@djbside1965]

Rest in Peace, Al Worden (1932-2020), and thanks for a lifetime of excellence. You will be sadly missed, but never forgotten, Sir.

[@1936Studebaker]

This is one of the best Astronaut interviews I've seen, Al tells it well.

[@theoriginaldrpizza]

Awesome. Thanks, Google! I'm going to be playing a few excerpts of this for my physics class. Mr. Worden is incredibly interesting. I could listen to him talk all day.

[@theoriginaldrpizza]

What an interesting person; I could listen to him talk for hours. I'll be showing a few excerpts to my physics class - having an astronaut explain zero g's (freefall) may help it sink in a little better. :)

[@bmapes16]

Great talk, learned a lot about what it was like to fly on the Apollo 15 mission as well as space flight in general.

[@vladvostok1723]

WE HAD THE GREAT PRIVILEGE TO MEET APOLLO-15 COMMAND MODULE PIOLET AL WORDEN ON THE 13/07/2019 IN COCOA BEACH, FLORIDA - THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE APOLLO-11 MOON LANDING. GREAT GUY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@dpratte]

I could listen to him for quite a while.

[@MrDoneboy]

I'm guilty of forgetting about Al, but I won't make the same mistake twice! What a great spokesman for the NASA lunar program.

[@brianbachmeier34]

Amazing! I apreciate all of the details and passion. Thanks

[@MarvelousLXVII]

RIP we lost a great astronaut today. Edit: changed "good" to "great."

[@_starter]

1:04:32 Anyone have a link to these photos. He talks about taking photos of low light phenomena with 10 second exposures and light sensitive film. These photos must be amazing..

[@ianwilds3139]

We're still waiting

[@CaribSurfKing1]

Hey Al, Cernan was a lunar module pilot and bumped Gordon a command pilot to become a commander on 17

[@MarvelousLXVII]

He didn't bump Gordon. Gordon was slated to command Apollo 18 that got cancelled.

[@muhammadihsan9964]

Responding to Al's statement at 15:46. Actually there is one LMP in the history of NASA who becomes Apollo mission Commander without ever becoming a CMP first. He is Gene Cernan, the Commander of Apollo 17. He flew in Apollo 10 as the LMP and became a moonwalker in Apollo 17 as a Commander.

[@downlink5877]

and Fred Haise was on course to do it on Apollo 19

[@cavejockey]

today i've just finished readig his awesome book, very interest, amusing and full of familiar things how to eat, to sleep, headache, navigation and much more;

[@MarvelousLXVII]

Next, read Carrying the Fire by Michael Collins (if you have not yet...)

[@ianwilds3139]

@@MarvelousLXVII whose recollection of viewing the stars from up there do you like better?

[@MarvelousLXVII]

@@ianwilds3139 Worden's without a doubt.

[@DavidC_92]

Wish I could meet Col. Worden one day

[@MarvelousLXVII]

I actually emailed him after reading his wonderful book and he emailed back.

[@CptMikeTango1]

One guy really liked his computer😄

[@Ellwoodsss1]

I'd love to hear what he thinks about SpaceX today

[@downlink5877]

For all the pedants in the comments: jumping LMP to CDR only became a thing *later* on in the program, when Deke Slayton was running out of assignable crew and had to bend his previous rules.

[@gregson99]

how come they went to the moon backwards he said but yet they had to turn the craft for heating issues?

[@miloszplaczek8732]

They flew backwards as it didn't cause a change of their path - Newton's laws state this. The idea of rotating the craft is to prevent one part to heat by itself to like 300C, instead - by rotating at a speed of 1/2 RPM will make sure each part is equally heated and thus it will expand simultaneously.

[@gregson99]

well logic would tell me they would see the moon if they are rotating to prevent 1 side from overheating. He said they couldnt see it approaching. Or was the sun angled to the side of the craft when they made the flight?

[@miloszplaczek8732]

To my understand, I doubt they'd have windows facing down towards the moon. So they would face with their engine

[@gregson99]

Im just trying to get a mental picture of where the sun was when they made the flight across. Then maybe i would understand why they never saw the moon approach.

[@trohlack5150]

Long axis of the two spacecraft in line with a line from earth to moon. Back of service module facing moon and bottom of lunar module towards earth. Sun is perpendicular to long axis of mated spacecraft

[@markbell9742]

Thanks, fantastic!

[@GuruGuru3]

Reality 9.600. Flat earth 100 millions! And then school and teachers are the problem.

[@rgsnr8702]

i met this man at Kennedy space centre a few years ago ,he was such an interesting man to talk to ,my son was using a 360 degree action camera when we met him and my son explained to him about the 360 camera's technology he was amazed at all the technology around today at the side of what they had to manage with ,God bless him I have created a collage to his memory www.flickr.com/photos/ironmonger/49709305467/in/dateposted/

[@GuruGuru3]

23:38 !!!

[@KearnuPhoenix]

Are there any more times in this talk where he alludes to his classified knowledge? (secret stuff)

[@downlink5877]

I saw him give a lecture back in 2011, and he went into this in a bit more detail. He is convinced that whatever ended up as human life began elsewhere in the universe. Ed Mitchell from Apollo 14 thought something similar.

[@YousAHunter]

F to pay respects

[@CptMikeTango1]

Well a LMP could have been a commander, cernan for example

[@MarvelousLXVII]

Alan Bean was a LMP that commanded the second Skylab mission as well--not the same thing but you get what I mean.

[@liveincar]

Just a white wash of stars on the other side.

[@stevehislop]

46:26min Q:"We gave up our man flight capabillities (no space shuttles anymore in 2011).What do you think does it take to get it back?" Al Worden: " A new President..." Jzus Christ-did he have X-Ray-vision or what??? NASA in the sixties sure knew how to pick intelligent and talented people for their space program.Al sure was one of their brightest.

[@Anonymous-or4ru]

I believe the Apollo missions happened and think the whole hoax stuff is bullshit. The guy in the audience posed a great, off the cuff question related to Al's earlier explanation of navigation but did anyone else notice the delay in Al Worden's answer to his question? It struck me as being a pregnant pause and Al's tone in his initial response seemed unusual. Q&A from 56:10

[@candide_rus]

He was inventing an answer on the way, and eventually quickly changed the subject. The number of blunders this guy makes when talking about the navigation system or the life in cosmos is critically high. Nowadays, with enormous amount of information about space flights, this looks childishly ridiculous to anyone who spent some time to seriously investigate the issue. That their alleged 12-day-long space flight did not take place is clear for one very simple reason: after weightlessness of that duration without at least 2 hours of daily physical exercises on special devices, training all sorts of muscles (which they did not perform), people returning from space experience heart attack with high risk of infarction because of descent gravity (the heart muscle weakens to that extent). In any case, after a flight of this duration without daily exercises, astronauts are unable to stand, let alone walk, for many hours, and have to be carried by other people. Their recovery is slow and takes several days at least. This information was not well known in 1960's, and in programs like Gemini 5 and 7 or Apollos, the Americans mistakenly demonstrated all astronauts looking invariably hale and hearty right after return. So, they did not even stay on the Earth orbit during this period (as some say), and their returns were staged. One can argue indefinitely about footage, photos and other technical things, but there is no way around this purely human argument; and all these facts are now very well appreciated.

[@frukwon420]

whys this dude have such a weird laugh