American astronaut William Alison Anders died in a plane crash on June 7, 2024. He piloted a single-engine Beechcraft T-34 Mentor aircraft, performing aerobatic maneuvers on it. Without breaking out of the loop, the plane crashed into the water off the San Juan Islands in Washington state. He was 90 years old. In December 1968, he was a member of the crew of Apollo 8, the first three people to leave low Earth orbit and travel to the Moon. During one of the mission's lunar orbits, he took the iconic Earthrise photograph.