Michael Collins (astronaut) Michael Collins (astronaut) Michael Collins (born October 31, 1930) (Major General, USAF, Retired) is an American former astronaut and test pilot. Selected as part of the third group of fourteen astronauts in 1963, he flew into space twice. His first spaceflight was on Gemini 10, in which he and Command Pilot John Young performed two rendezvous with different spacecraft and undertook two extra-vehicular activities (EVAs, also known as spacewalks). His second spaceflight was as the Command Module Pilot for Apollo 11. While he stayed in orbit around the Moon, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin left in the Lunar Module to
Buzz Aldrin Humanitarian Award from Variety, the Children's Charity, which, according to the organization, "is given to an individual who has shown unusual understanding, empathy, and devotion to mankind." In 2006, the Space Foundation awarded him its highest honor, the General James E. Hill Lifetime Space Achievement Award. Aldrin received honorary degrees from six colleges and universities, and was named as the Chancellor of the International Space University in 2015. He was a member of the National Space Society's Board of Governors, and has served as the organization's chairman. In 2016, his hometown middle school in Montclair, New Jersey was renamed Buzz