Former NASA astronaut Bruce McCandless II, best known as the first person to float freely and untethered in space – as depicted in the iconic above photograph – has died. He was 80.
It’s kind of hard to fathom the magnitude of what he did these days. Imagine the feeling of floating out of a shuttle airlock, untethering and just floating out there in the vacuum of space. Unthinkable.
We’re saddened by the loss of retired astronaut Bruce McCandless II. Most known for being the 1st human to free-float on a shuttle spacewalk, he also served as the Apollo 11 moonwalkers’ link to mission control and helped launch @NASAHubble: https://t.co/myyOm101DR pic.twitter.com/jZeGvWzOxW
— NASA (@NASA) December 22, 2017
A retired U. S. Navy captain, McCandless was one of 19 astronauts selected by NASA in 1966. He performed his famous spacewalk on STS-41B in 1984. He also served as serving as the mission control communicator for Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin‘s moonwalk on the Apollo 11 mission. It’s fair to say the bloke has seen a bit of space history.
Check out his legendary spacewalk below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTGS4kDUy3M
Writing in 2015, he described the moment in question:
My wife [Bernice] was at mission control, and there was quite a bit of apprehension. I wanted to say something similar to Neil [Armstrong] when he landed on the moon, so I said, ‘It may have been a small step for Neil, but it’s a heck of a big leap for me.’ That loosened the tension a bit.
No cause of death has been released. RIP.
