Mankind’s final tribute paid to hero Armstrong
WASHINGTON — The first moon-walker was eulogized as a rare and humble hero Thursday in a deeply moving ceremony that was less than Neil Alden Armstrong deserved, but far more than he would have wanted.
Known for ever to humanity as the ice-veined astronaut who, with Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin, guided a lunar module named Eagle to touchdown on the Sea of Tranquillity in 1969 with warning buzzers blaring and less than 15 seconds of descent-stage fuel remaining, Armstrong died of heart failure three weeks ago, in his native Ohio, at the age of 82.
“This is a global icon, a national hero of unimaginable proportion, and a name that will live in history long after all of us here are gone,” the last of the 12 Americans who landed on Luna between Armstrong’s “giant leap for mankind” and the Apollo program’s termination in December 1972 told more than 2,000 mourners at Washington’s earthquake-damaged National Cathedral.
“He knew who he was,” commander Eugene Cernan of Apollo 17 went on from the pulpit. “He knew the immensity of what he had done. But in Neil’s mind, it was never about Neil. Never, ever, ever about Neil.”
Apollo 11 command module pilot Michael Collins led a Celtic prayer to “the moon that is above us, the Earth that is beneath us,” a terrestrial vantage that only the dwindling ranks of translunar astronauts ever have seen inverted. Eight Apollo moonwalkers remain alive.