NASA will give its Ambassador of Exploration Award to Colorado astronaut Jack Swigert, who died in 1982 just after he was elected to Congress.
NASA will present the award to Swigert’s family Friday at the Wings Over the Rockies Air & Space Museum in Denver. The award, a moon rock encased in Lucite, will be displayed at the museum.
Astronauts in the first three NASA programs — Mercury, Gemini and Apollo — are receiving the award.
Swigert was the command module pilot for the Apollo 13 mission, which had to be aborted when an oxygen tank ruptured.
He was born in Denver and received a degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Colorado. He died of complications from cancer before he could take his seat in the U.S. House.
At the 7:00 p.m. ceremony Friday, Apollo 13 Commander Jim Lovell will be speak in honor of Swigert. The museum expects a dozen of Colorado’s astronauts to be in attendance, including Mercury astronaut Scott Carpenter and shuttle astronaut Jeff Ashby.
Tickets to the ceremony cost $20 and can be obtained by calling 303-360-5360 ext. 105.
The award presentation also kicks off a new exhibit at the museum, “Colorado’s Astronauts: In Their Own Words,” featuring “personal reflections, memorabilia and artifacts of more than 60 astronauts with Colorado ties,” the museum said in a news release.
