Apollo 13 moon mission leader James Lovell dies

James Lovell, the commander of Apollo 13 who helped turn a failed moon mission into a triumph of on-the-fly can-do engineering, has died. He was 97.

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Lovell died Thursday in Lake Forest, Illinois, NASA said in a statement on Friday.

"Jim's character and steadfast courage helped our nation reach the Moon and turned a potential tragedy into a success from which we learned an enormous amount," NASA said. "We mourn his passing even as we celebrate his achievements."

One of NASA's most traveled astronauts in the agency's first decade, Lovell flew four times — Gemini 7, Gemini 12, Apollo 8, and Apollo 13 — with the two Apollo flights riveting the folks back on Earth.