At the age of 28, McCandless was selected as the youngest member of NASA Astronaut Group 5 (jokingly labeled the "Original Nineteen" by John W. Young) in April 1966.[4] According to space historian Matthew Hersch, McCandless and Group 5 colleague Don L. Lind were "effectively treated ... as scientist-astronauts" (akin to those selected in the fourth and sixth groups) by NASA due to their substantial scientific experience, an implicit reflection of their lack of the test pilot experience highly valued by Deke Slayton and other NASA managers at the time; this would ultimately delay their progression in the flight rotation.[5]
He served as mission control capsule communicator (CAPCOM) on Apollo 11 during the launch and during the first lunar moonwalk (EVA) by Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin before joining the astronaut support crew for the Apollo 14 mission, on which he doubled as a CAPCOM.[6] Thereafter, McCandless was reassigned to the Skylab program, where he received his first crew assignment as backup pilot for the space station's first crewed mission alongside backup commander Rusty Schweickart and backup science pilot Story Musgrave.[7] Following this assignment, he again served as a CAPCOM on Skylab 3 and Skylab 4. Notably, McCandless was a co-investigator on the M-509 astronaut maneuvering unit experiment that was flown on Skylab; this eventually led to his collaboration on the development of the Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU) used during Space Shuttle EVAs.[8] Although he was classified as a Shuttle pilot until 1983, McCandless ultimately chose to work on the MMU as a mission specialist due to the prestige of the program (which ensured a flight assignment) and his lack of test pilot experience.[9]
This mission marked the first checkout of the MMU and Manipulator Foot Restraint (MFR). McCandless made the first untethered free flight on each of the two MMUs carried on board, thereby becoming the first person to make an untethered spacewalk.[3] He described the experience:[11]
I was grossly over-trained. I was just anxious to get out there and fly. I felt very comfortable ... It got so cold my teeth were chattering and I was shivering, but that was a very minor thing. ... I'd been told of the quiet vacuum you experience in space, but with three radio links saying, 'How's your oxygen holding out?', 'Stay away from the engines!' and 'When's my turn?', it wasn't that peaceful ... It was a wonderful feeling, a mix of personal elation and professional pride: it had taken many years to get to that point.
McCandless's first EVA lasted 6 hours and 17 minutes. The second EVA (in which Stewart used the MMU) lasted 5 hours and 55 minutes.[12]
On February 11, 1984, after eight days in orbit, Challenger made the first landing on the runway at Kennedy Space Center.[3]
On this five-day Discovery flight, launched on April 24, 1990, from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the crew deployed the Hubble Space Telescope from their record-setting altitude of 380 miles (610 km).[3]
During the deployment of Hubble, one of the observatory's solar arrays stopped as it unfurled. While ground controllers searched for a way to command HST to unreel the solar array, Mission Specialists McCandless and Kathryn D. Sullivan began preparing for a contingency spacewalk in the event that the array could not be deployed through ground control. The array eventually came free and unfurled through ground control, while McCandless and Sullivan were pre-breathing inside the partially depressurized airlock.[13]
In an August 2005 Smithsonian magazine article about the MMU photo, McCandless is quoted as saying that the subject's anonymity is its best feature. "I have the sun visor down, so you can't see my face, and that means it could be anybody in there. It's sort of a representation not of Bruce McCandless, but mankind."[18]
On September 30, 2010, McCandless launched a lawsuit against British singer Dido for unauthorized use of a photo of his 1984 space flight for the album art of her 2008 album Safe Trip Home, which showed McCandless "free flying" about 320 feet away from the Space Shuttle Challenger.[19] The lawsuit, which also named Sony Corp.'s Sony Music Entertainment and Getty Images as defendants, did not allege copyright infringement but infringement of his persona.[20][21] The action was settled amicably on January 14, 2011.[22]
McCandless wrote the foreword to the book Live TV from Orbit by Dwight Steven-Boniecki.[23]
McCandless died on December 21, 2017, at age 80.[24] He was survived by his second wife, Ellen Shields McCandless, two children and two grandchildren.[25]
McCandless' son, author Bruce McCandless III, wrote about the journey leading to the first untethered spacewalk in the 2021 book Wonders All Around: The Incredible True Story of Astronaut Bruce McCandless II and the First Untethered Flight in Space.
Legacy
John McCain, who graduated from the United States Naval Academy with McCandless in the Class of 1958, stated after McCandless' death:[11]
The iconic photo of Bruce soaring effortlessly in space has inspired generations of Americans to believe that there is no limit to the human potential.
Lockheed Martin later developed the McCandless Lunar Lander and named it after him. This honored him as an esteemed employee of the company, and also the fact that the MMU spacewalk was facilitated by the jetpack developed by Lockheed Martin.
^ abcMcCandless III, Bruce (2021). Wonders All Around: The Incredible True Story of Astronaut Bruce McCandless II and the First Untethered Flight in Space. Greenleaf Book Group Press. ISBN978-1626348653.
^Shayler, David J.; Burgess, Colin (2017). The last of NASA's original pilot astronauts : expanding the space frontier in the late sixties. Cham: Springer. p. 318. ISBN9783319510149. OCLC990337270.
^McCandless v. Sony Music Entertainment et al., Case No. CV10-7323-RGK (C.D. Cal.) (Docket No. 4 [Notice Of Settlement And Dismissal With Prejudice], filed January 14, 2011)
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