Sarah Kaplan08:17, Apr 29 2021 GETTY Astronaut Michael Collins, who orbited the moon while Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin took giant leaps for mankind on its surface, has died at the age of 90. On July 20, 1969, eight years after President John F Kennedy pledged to land a man on the lunar surface and return him safely to Earth, astronaut Michael Collins sat alone in the command module Columbia. He was floating 60 miles (96.5km) above what he later called the "withered, sun-seared peach pit" of the moon. A lander carrying his fellow Apollo 11 crewmen, Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin, sped away from the main craft, en route to fulfilling Kennedy's goal.