Apollo 8 astronaut William Anders, who took iconic Earthrise photo, dies in plane crash

Friday Harbour, Washington: Retired Major General William Anders, the former Apollo 8 astronaut who took the iconic “Earthrise” photo showing the planet as a shadowed blue marble from space in 1968, was killed when the plane he was piloting plummeted into the waters off the San Juan Islands in Washington state. He was 90. His son, Greg Anders, confirmed the death to The Associated Press.

“The family is devastated,” Greg Anders said. “He was a great pilot and we will miss him terribly.”

Anders said the photo was his most significant contribution to the space program, given the ecological philosophical impact it had, along with making sure the Apollo 8 command module and service module worked.

Earlier, a report came in that an older-model plane had crashed into the water and sank near the north end of Jones Island, San Juan County Sheriff Eric Peter said.

Only the pilot was on board the Beech A45 airplane at the time, according to the Federal Aviation Association.

William Anders said in an 1997 NASA oral history interview that he didn’t think the Apollo 8 mission was risk-free but there were important national, patriotic and exploration reasons for going ahead.

He estimated there was a one-in-three chance that the crew wouldn’t make it back and the same chance the mission would be a success and the same chance that the mission wouldn’t start to begin with. He said he suspected Christopher Columbus sailed with worse odds.

He recounted how Earth looked fragile and seemingly physically insignificant from the moon, yet was home.