He nodded towards the pain inflicted by storm Sandy and then moved on to the stump speech that anyone who has attended more than one rally knows so well - the five-point plan, the anecdote about the US flag rescued from the space shuttle Challenger disaster, the dully-delivered homilies about the need for change.

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And the first man to leave footprints in the lunar dust, Apollo 11 Commander Neil Armstrong -- aside from geologist Schmitt, the only other civilian in the collection of moonwalkers -- later sat on several corporate boards and the presidential commission that investigated the 1986 Challenger space shuttle disaster.

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One example that See uses in the classroom: the 1986 Challenger disaster, when the space shuttle blew apart 73 seconds into its flight, killing the seven crew members.

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Carrying the aerospace analogy, Simmons says the investigation into this disaster will be akin to that following the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger.

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He returned to NASA twice to serve on boards of enquiry, the first into the near-disaster of Apollo 13, the second into the disintegration of the space shuttle Challenger in 1986.

ECONOMIST: Neil Armstrong