Customer Reviews

Falling to Earth: An Apollo 15 Astronaut's Journey to the Moon

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I am a big Apollo buff and have been since I was a kid. I've read every astronaut autobiography I could get my hands on, but I have to admit I knew very little about Al Worden other than the odd mention from other astronauts. I thoroughly enjoyed this glimpse into his life and can now add him to my list of Apollo heroes. I'm glad he finally decided to share his experiences with his..........better late than never! If you are a space buff you will enjoy this book; well written and entertaining all the way through. I highly recommend it!

Was there ever an Astronaut as poorly treated by his employer as Al Worden?
It would be hard to find one.
This is not your normal astronaut biography. This is a ride through a remarkable career, beginning in the pre-Word War Two farms of Upper Michigan through the honor of being selected to West Point, overseas Test Pilot duty in England to the high deserts of California and finally as one of the elite few to be selected as Astronaut, Al Worden and Francis French follow Worden's personal story through the highs and lows of a career that straddled the Golden Age of Space Exploration.
Most people may not know Worden's name until now. But he was one of the few men to fly around the moon. As Apollo 15s command module pilot, he may have had one of the most responsible jobs one could be assigned on any lunar mission....getting the crew home safe.

As the First Rookie astronaut selected as a command Module Pilot for a lunar mission (Apollo 12 Backup) Al Worden was at high when he Commander Dave Scott and Lunar Module Pilot Jim Irwin were selected to fly the first long duration exploration of the moon as the Prime Crew of Apollo 15.
Upon completion of their mission-which by anyone standards was one of the highlights of the Apollo Moon program -they met with World Leaders and the Pope, toured the world as NASA elite and then.....over simple harmless lapse in judgment it all came crashing down.....
I wont give the story away. For those who know the story of Apollo 15 and its aftermath as I did, the book was full of surprises. And for those who do not, you will be left stunned that NASA could develop such a highly skilled astronaut and then so carelessly toss away the same talent over such a trivial matter.

I found this book to be honest and forth coming. Worden/French have no Axe to grind here. He is simply telling a story from his from his point of view, a story which he refused to discuss in detail for over 40 years until now and a story that needed
to be told.
Al Worden simply states the facts as he recalls them, selflessly assigning blame for a trivial lapse in judgment
that carried such devastating results and lets the reader decide if the punishment fit.

In his previous books Francis French has worked with highly regarded space writer Collin Burgess and now with Al Worden has added yet another fine edition to the growing list of excellent books that have been published of late by these two authors. The book is well written and well paced allowing the story to flow, and not get bogged down with technical details. This is human story about the ups and downs of one Astronauts life. You do not have to be a space enthusiast to enjoy this one, this is a story that anyone will find interesting. An excellent read.

Most of the books that cover the golden years of space exploration are welcome and especially this one by Al Worden. More than any other astronaut, he truly puts the reader in his seat as he marvelled at visiting the moon. So rare was this experience that it has to be appreciated that he did his best to describe it.
But this story is unique because he got into trouble with NASA and paid a undue price for it. The behind the scenes politicking at NASA and other background tidbits make for interesting reading.
Falling to earth is a smooth read, not overwrought with analysis of the state of the U.S, space program. Above that, the reader feels he genuinely knows this man who was not a standout at the time because he did his job well and then melted into the background while others returned to the moon.
A little more time could have been spent on updating the reader on the troubles that his commander Dave Scott found himself in years later. He was convicted of fraud and further thoughts on this should have been included because Scott turned out to be not the kind of man who should have been in charge of more upstanding men who were lucky and talented enough to be included on this magnificent adventure.
Peter Faulkner,
Calgary Alberta

In fairness, I should point out that I have collaborated with Francis French on two books for the University of Nebraska Press, but my only input to this remarkable book has been to read through the draft looking for any hidden faults for the authors. This is truly an exceptional piece of writing, and tells a story filled with dramatic facts about the flight and aftermath of Apollo 15 that has long been concealed from public scrutiny, albeit known in essence by those who follow spaceflight history. Al Worden was the Command Module Pilot aboard Apollo 15 who not only participated in one of the most significant science missions in all of spaceflight history, but suffered the dire consequences of an error in human judgement that led to the entire crew being publicly stood down from future NASA flight duties. This book has been described in another (Amazon U.S.) review as "no holds barred," and that is a true description of the revelations Worden makes in this book. In the first part of the book we learn about his childhood upbringing and the many influences in his early life, and then the military and flying career that brought him to the attention of NASA. As a member of the fifth group of astronauts he came to know many of his colleagues very well, some certainly not as the superhuman beings portrayed in the popular media of the time, but as human beings, with their differing traits and foibles.

Next, Worden takes us through his training for the Apollo 15 mission, and his dedication to the science involved in the mission is evident in his masterful words, which allows us a unique, behind-the-scenes look at what is involved in preparing for an Apollo lunar mission. The tragedy of Apollo 15 is that it is mostly known for two things; not only widely regarded as the most successful of all the Apollo moonlanding missions, which amassed an amazing amount of data and results, but for the public chastisement and humiliation of the crew over some postal covers they innocently carried on board - something that had gone unquestioned and unchallenged in almost every previous U.S. human space mission. In Worden's case, he went from being acclaimed a hero of a massively successful space mission to a stunned and shunned innocent being virtually sacked by NASA and shunted off to a small office at the Ames Research Center. Those who knew Al Worden will know he was not one to take such unwarranted persecution lightly, and in this book he sets out in very concise prose the actions he took, and in dramatic fashion lays the blame squarely where he feels it belongs - even at the expense of questioning the actions (or lack of action) of his fellow crewmembers.

This is an unrelentingly good story, filled with heroics of the Right Stuff calibre, but also one which tells for the first, full time the iniquitous way in which NASA and the U.S. government treated three men who had done nothing more than fall into the trap of simply doing what other astronauts and crews had done before them. They were savaged in Congress and in the press of the day, and the covers issue today remains an unfair blight on an otherwise amazing flight to the moon and back.

Al Worden will obviously alienate some people with whom he worked and flew in this revealing, hard-hitting book, but he will also make a host of new friends and allies as readers follow him on this most incredible journey through life and into space, and the aftermath of a notorious, unwarranted scandal that brought his otherwise-spotless career and reputation to an abrupt halt.

As one would expect of the eloquent Al Worden, this is a first-rate book. He and Francis French have masterfully put together an absorbing, true-life tale that will be read and appreciated by many. Despite my own meagre participation in this book, I regard it as a new classic of the space age.