{"id":18501,"date":"2018-05-26T20:34:44","date_gmt":"2018-05-26T12:34:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/astronaut-alan-bean-apollo-12s-artistic-moonwalker-dies-at-86-after-sudden-illness\/"},"modified":"2018-05-26T20:34:44","modified_gmt":"2018-05-26T12:34:44","slug":"astronaut-alan-bean-apollo-12s-artistic-moonwalker-dies-at-86-after-sudden-illness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/astronaut-alan-bean-apollo-12s-artistic-moonwalker-dies-at-86-after-sudden-illness\/","title":{"rendered":"Astronaut Alan Bean, Apollo 12\u2019s artistic moonwalker, dies at 86 after sudden illness"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Alan
Astronaut Alan Bean poses for a portrait in front of a mockup of NASA\u2019s lunar module in advance of his Apollo 12 moon mission in 1969. (NASA Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Artist-astronaut Alan Bean, the moonwalker who saw himself as different from the rest, died today at the age of 86 at Houston Medical Hospital.<\/p>\n

Bean\u2019s death followed a sudden illness that befell him two weeks earlier during a trip to Fort Wayne, Ind., for a school fundraising event.<\/p>\n

He became the fourth human to walk on the moon during the Apollo 12 mission in November 1969, exploring Oceanus Procellarum alongside the late astronaut Pete Conrad. Bean also commanded the second crewed flight to Skylab, America\u2019s first space station, in 1973.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlan was the strongest and kindest man I ever knew. He was the love of my life, and I miss him dearly,\u201d Leslie Bean, his wife of 40 years, said in a statement released by NASA and the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation. \u201cA native Texan, Alan died peacefully in Houston surrounded by those who loved him.\u201d<\/p>\n

NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said the space agency mourned his loss.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlan Bean once said \u2018I have the nicest life in the world,\u2019 \u201d Bridenstine said in a statement. \u201cIt\u2019s a comforting sentiment to recall as we mourn his passing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Alan
Astronaut-artist Alan Bean speaks at the 2009 opening of an exhibit titled \u201cAlan Bean: Painting Apollo, First Artist on Another World\u201d at the Smithsonian\u2019s National Air and Space Museum in Washington. (NASA Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Bean served as a test pilot in the U.S. Navy, and was among 14 trainees who were selected by NASA in 1963 for its third group of astronauts \u2014 after the Mercury Seven and the New Nine.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlan and I have been best friends for 55 years \u2014 ever since the day we became astronauts,\u201d said Walt Cunningham, who flew on Apollo 7. \u201cWe are accustomed to losing friends in our business, but this is a tough one.\u201d<\/p>\n

Apollo 17\u2019s Harrison Schmitt, the only professional scientist to walk on the moon, praised the contribution that Bean and Conrad made to lunar geology. He said the 75 pounds of lunar samples they collected were \u201ca scientific gift that keeps on giving today and in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTheir description of bright green concentrations of olivine (peridot) as \u2018ginger ale bottle glass,\u2019 however, gave geologists in Mission Control all a big laugh, as we knew exactly what they had discovered,\u201d Schmitt said in a statement.<\/p>\n