Canceled Apollo missions planning their own circumlunar flight for December to upstage the Americans once again (see Zond program). McDivitt's crew—who had grown accustomed to working with LM-3 and preparing for its flight—was kept on the D mission which now became Apollo 9, while Borman's crew would fly the CSM lunar orbit mission on Apollo 8, and the E mission was canceled. The swap of crews was also decisive in who would be the first man to walk on the Moon. Pete Conrad was backup Commander for McDivitt's crew, and by the process of crew rotation, would have been in line for Commander
Apollo 13 the Command Module Pilot. Seven days before launch, the backup lunar module pilot, Charlie Duke, contracted rubella from one of his children. This exposed both the prime and backup crews, who trained together. Mattingly was found to be the only one of the other five who had not had rubella as a child and thus was not immune. Three days before launch, at the insistence of the Flight Surgeon, Swigert was moved to the prime crew. Mattingly never contracted rubella and was assigned after the mission as command module pilot to Young's crew, which later flew Apollo 16, the fifth