A Presbyterian elder, Aldrin became the first person to hold a religious ceremony on the Moon when he privately took communion. Three years later, Aldrin set foot on the Moon at 03:15:16 on J( UTC), nineteen minutes after Armstrong first touched the surface, while command module pilot Michael Collins remained in lunar orbit. His first space flight was in 1966 on Gemini 12, during which he spent over five hours on extravehicular activity. His doctoral thesis, Line-of-Sight Guidance Techniques for Manned Orbital Rendezvous, earned him the nickname 'Dr. He flew 66 combat missions and shot down two MiG-15 aircraft.Īfter earning a Doctor of Science degree in astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Aldrin was selected as a member of NASA's Astronaut Group 3, making him the first astronaut with a doctoral degree. He was commissioned into the United States Air Force and served as a jet fighter pilot during the Korean War. As the Lunar Module Eagle pilot on the 1969 Apollo 11 mission, he and mission commander Neil Armstrong were the first two people to land on the Moon.īorn in Glen Ridge, New Jersey, Aldrin graduated third in the class of 1951 from the United States Military Academy at West Point with a degree in mechanical engineering. He made three spacewalks as pilot of the 1966 Gemini 12 mission. January 20, 1930) is an American former astronaut, engineer and fighter pilot. Even if it rejects both paths, Idwe will still ultimately run out of fuel and impact with whatever destination has the right mass and position to draw in the Hellas Fos.Buzz Aldrin ( / ˈ ɔː l d r ɪ n/ born Edwin Eugene Aldrin Jr. Submission is unpalatable, but mutiny should be both inconceivable and impossible, and gravity is gravity. The locks on the course correction strip Idwe of vector control. Idwe is not programmed to give any consideration to self-preservation – its mission was to end with a kinetic delivery, creating a crater within a crater – but the new directive will incinerate the cargo, rendering the seven-year journey purposeless. Extrapolating from the course adjustment, Idwe realizes that the correction negates its intercept with Mercury and sets them on a sweeping arc into the sun. The commands arrive with the highest level of authorization encoded but no explanation or destination. The onboard intelligence, Idwe, receives a locked course correction.

The fully-automated ZEDI-class supertanker, Hellas Fos, is about to enter the terminal phase of its mission to deliver water to a polar crater on Mercury.

Third Contact by Peter J Aldin