Jim Lovell first went into space aboard Gemini 7 in 1965. He was also the Gemini 12 mission commander before serving as the command module pilot on Apollo 8, the first time humans orbited the Moon.
In 1970 Lovell made his final flight into space aboard the ill-fated Apollo 13. The planned third lunar landing had to be aborted when an oxygen tank explosion crippled the spacecraft en route to the Moon. Lovell and his fellow astronauts narrowly survived their ordeal.
Photo: Jim Lovell speaks to the Senate Space Committee after the Apollo 13 mission (NASA)
Apollo 8 orbited the Moon on Christmas Eve in 1968 and temporarily lost contact with mission controllers when the spacecraft went behind the Moon. This mission was one of the final test flights before the 1969 Apollo 11 lunar landing.
The BBC's James Burke and astronaut Jim Lovell describe the Apollo 13 accident and how they used the lunar module (LM) to escape the stricken command/service module.
Apollo 13 astronaut Jim Lovell talks about the Apollo programme stress tests that were used to assess potential astronauts.
Jim Lovell and his fellow astronauts tell the BBC's James Burke what happened when nature called during the Apollo and Gemini missions.
The 1968 Apollo 8 spacecraft was the first manned probe to orbit the Moon. The astronauts on board were Frank Borman, James Lovell and William Anders.
James "Jim" Arthur Lovell, Jr., (born March 25, 1928) is a former NASA astronaut and a retired captain in the United States Navy, most famous as the commander of the Apollo 13 mission, which suffered a critical failure en route to the Moon but was brought back safely to Earth by the efforts of the crew and mission control. Lovell was also the command module pilot of Apollo 8, the first Apollo mission to enter lunar orbit. Lovell is a recipient of the Congressional Space Medal of Honor and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He is one of only 24 people to have flown to the Moon, the first of only three people to fly to the Moon twice, and the only one to have flown there twice without making a landing. Lovell was also the first person to fly in space four times.
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