KSC-2009-4345

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – NASA will honor Apollo astronaut Al Worden with the presentation of this Ambassador of Exploration Award, a moon rock encased in Lucite, mounted for public display. He is being honored for his contributions to the U.S. space program. Worden received the award during a ceremony July 30 at the Apollo Saturn V Center at NASA's Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Florida, where the moon rock will be displayed. Worden served as command module pilot for the Apollo 15 mission, which set several moon records for NASA, including the longest lunar surface stay time, the longest lunar extravehicular activity and the first use of a lunar roving vehicle. Worden spent 38 minutes in a spacewalk outside the command module and logged a total of 295 hours, 11 minutes in space during the mission. NASA is giving the Ambassador of Exploration Award to the first generation of explorers in the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo space programs for realizing America's goal of going to the moon. The rock is part of the 842 pounds of lunar samples collected during six Apollo expeditions from 1969 to 1972. Those astronauts who receive the award will then present the award to a museum of the

Date: 2009-07-30
Collection: KSC
Archive: NASA Image and Video Library
Type: photograph