He was the first man on the moon. Neil Alden Armstrong has passed away according to NBC. He was 82. When he was 39, he became the first person to set foot on the Moon, and along with Buzz Alrin, made the first successful landing on the lunar surface. His is the voice that offered the famous lines “this is one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.” The ‘a’ in the statement was lost due to transmission interference.

Armstrong was a test pilot, aerospace engineer, university professor, and United States Naval Aviator in addition to being an astronaut.

Armstrong was born on 5 August 1930 in Wapakoneta, Ohio. He spent a very short period of time in space- a bit over eight days, and made only one trip outside of the space craft. These may seem trifling compared to the time that many astronauts spend in space today.

Armstrong made two trips into space. The first was as part of Gemini 8 and the second Apollo 11. Following his work on Apollo 11, he would go on to become a professor at the University of Cincinnati despite having only a Masters in Science degree. He would be appointed to the investigation teams of two disastrous space missions. The first time was after he was appointed by President Richard Nixon as part of the investigations into Apollo 13, and the second was as part of the commission looking into the destruction of the Space Shuttle Challenger. In that investigation, he worked with the late Sally Ride.

After he left NASA, there was pressure for him to enter politics, but he refused.

Armstrong married twice.

On 5 August, Armstrong underwent surgery to clear some blocked arteries. It appears that this contributed to his death.