Mandla Maseko
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Mandla Maseko | |
|---|---|
| Born | 27 August 1988  Soshanguve |
| Died | 6 July 2019 (aged 30) |
| Other names | Afroboy |
Mandla Maseko (d. 6 July 2019) aimed to be the first black African in space.
He was a member of the South African Air Force. In 2013 he was one of 23 winners of a competition[1] by the Axe Apollo Space Academy[2] to attend a US space academy, out of a million entrants, in order to be the first black African in space. He was nicknamed "Afronaut" and "Spaceboy". He went to the Kennedy Space Centre for a week to do tests, such as skydiving and a journey on a reduced-gravity aircraft, ahead of a planned one-hour suborbital flight that was planned to take place in 2015. However, the flight did not happen, and the organiser, XCOR Aerospace, went bankrupt in 2017.[1]
He subsequently returned to the armed forces, and was a private pilot, as well as a DJ and biker. He died on 6 July 2019 in a motorbike accident, aged 30.[1]
References
- ^ a b c d "Would-be African astronaut dies in road crash". 8 July 2019. Retrieved 9 July 2019.
- ^ CNN, Stephanie Busari and Stephanie Halasz. "South African 'Spaceboy' set to be first black African in space dies in crash". CNN. Retrieved 9 July 2019.
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