He was also a physicist and a night fighter pilot.
Walter Cunningham, NASA astronaut who flew on Apollo 7, an 11-day mission manned mission in 1968 that paved the way for the first human landing on the Moon, has died at the age of 90, NASABorn in 1932, Walter Cunningham joined the U.S. Navy in 1951, where he served in the U.S. Marine Corps and flew 54 missions as a night fighter pilot In Korea before retiring at the rank of a colonel.
Cunningham's moment of glory arrived when he was designated as the lunar module pilot for the 11-day flight of Apollo 7, the first human flight test of the Apollo program. Launched on October 11, 1968, the mission with Walter M. Schirra, Jr. and Donn F. Eisele onboard, tested maneuvers necessary for docking and lunar orbit rendezvous using the third stage of Saturn IB launch vehicle, NASA said on its website.
Following the successful completion of eight tests, including igniting the service module engine and measuring the performance accuracy of all spacecraft systems, the crew splashed in the Atlantic Ocean after a 263-hour mission that flew 4.5 million miles. Just a year later, the mission paved the way for theThe crew is also remembered for providing the first live television broadcast of onboard activities for which they received an Emmy.
He also worked as a scientist for Rand, where he worked on classified defense studies and problems related to the Earth's magnetosphere. Over his lifetime, Cunningham had accumulated over 4,500 hours of flying time in 40 different aircraft. “Walt Cunningham was a fighter pilot, physicist, and an entrepreneur – but, above all, he was an explorer, said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson on its website. "On Apollo 7, the first launch of a crewed Apollo mission, Walt and his crewmates made history, paving the way for the
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