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Computer scientist Margaret Hamilton, whose work helped guide Apollo 11 astronauts to a safe landing on the Moon, has died at the age of 90, the BBC reported.
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where Hamilton worked from 1959 until the mid-1970s, confirmed her death on September 30. The university described her as a pioneer who was working in software engineering before the field became mainstream.
Hamilton managed MIT’s Software Engineering Division and led the team that wrote and tested the onboard flight software for NASA’s Apollo missions. The work helped guide Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin during the 1969 Apollo 11 landing.
Just before the landing, the spacecraft’s computer issued an alarm after becoming overloaded. Hamilton’s team had designed priority-driven software to suspend less important tasks and give priority to the landing, MIT said.
Hamilton later said she was drawn to the work because it had never been done before. “I was the first programmer to join and the first woman they hired,” she told the Guardian in 2019.
In 2016, then-President Barack Obama awarded Hamilton the Presidential Medal of Freedom in recognition of her contributions to science and space exploration.
Born in Indiana in 1936, Hamilton studied mathematics at the University of Michigan and earned a bachelor’s degree from Earlham College in 1958. She moved to Boston in 1959 with her husband, who was studying law.
Hamilton is survived by her daughter, son-in-law, two grandsons and four great-grandchildren, according to MIT. Earlham College said her pioneering spirit and legacy would continue to inspire future generations.
