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PROVO -- A former astronaut from the Apollo era in space spoke to BYU students Tuesday. James Lovell is best known for his role in the troubled Apollo 13 flight.
Lovell was the commander of Apollo 13, which launched 40 years ago next month. Tuesday, he recounted the tense, dramatic moments after multiple failures in the spacecraft. For a few days, it appeared the astronauts may be doomed and had no way to return to Earth.
"I shouldn't be here," Lovell said. "[I experienced] loss of oxygen, loss of electrical power, loss of propulsion system 200,000 miles from the Earth."
After Apollo 11 and 12, Lovell said few in America paid much attention to his lunar space mission, as it began. But a couple of days into it, a catastrophic disaster had the world's attention focused on the three astronauts.
Lovell's book was the basis for the Ron Howard-directed film "Apollo 13," starring Tom Hanks, who portrayed Lovell.
- Lovell was the pilot for the Gemini 7 mission in 1965 and the command pilot for Gemini 12 in 1966.
- He and fellow crewmen, Frank Borman and William A. Anders, became the first humans to leave the Earth's gravitational influence and travel to the moon during the Apollo 8 mission in 1968.
- On Lovell's fourth mission, he was the commander of Apollo 13 in 1970.
- He is the first man to journey twice to the moon.
-NASA
Tuesday, Lovell credited the other astronauts and the team on the ground, mission control, who did what it took to bring them safely home and prevented a national tragedy. In the words made famous in the movie, "failure [was] not an option."
"I'm here because of a very dedicated group of people in mission control who used those attributes which are necessary to be successful: leadership, teamwork, initiative, and perseverance, and motivation. That's why I am here today," Lovell said.
The former astronaut said while he is best remembered for Apollo 13, his favorite mission was the Apollo 8 mission, when he circled the moon two years before. While he said seeing the moon was impressive, it was looking back at the vibrant colors of the Earth that really changed his life.
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