NASA Astronaut Alfred “Al” Worden, command module pilot for Apollo 15 and one of the few to have orbited the moon, died Tuesday night, reports News 6 partner Florida Today.
In a statement on Worden's Twitter page, his family confirmed that the 88-year-old retired astronaut and Air Force colonel died in his sleep.
Worden was one of only 24 people to have flown to the moon. He was also the first astronaut to conduct a deep-space extravehicular activity, or EVA, during Apollo 15's return to Earth in 1971.
During Apollo 15, he orbited the moon dozens of times astronauts David Scott and James Irwin explored the surface. Worden was selected by NASA for the astronaut corps in 1966.