November 5, 2024

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Black astronaut into space 63 years after NASA rejection: ‘It took too long’ |  RTL News

Black astronaut into space 63 years after NASA rejection: ‘It took too long’ | RTL News

With his journey into space, 90-year-old Edward Dwight became the oldest person to ever go into space. Yesterday, he and five other passengers boarded a rocket from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ space company, Blue Origin.

The six took off from Texas and spent 9 minutes and 53 seconds at the edge of space. “It’s been a long time,” he said of the decades he’s waited for this moment.

In 1961, with the support of then-President John Kennedy, Dwight was selected as the first black astronaut candidate. He trained thoroughly, but he didn’t succeed in the end. It was rejected by the US space agency NASA.

Dwight writes that it was chosen at the time to make American space travel more diverse New York times. According to Dwight, the fact that he did not end up in space may have had something to do with racism, he told the American newspaper.

After Kennedy’s death in 1963, there was less and less support for Dwight Black’s role in American Rocket. He left the Air Force in 1966. Later in life, he owned a restaurant and became a real estate developer and famous artist. It wasn’t until 1983 that NASA sent a black astronaut into space.

Space tourism

At 90 years, eight months and 10 days old, Dwight is about two months older than Star Trek actor William Shatner was when he went into space with Blue Origin in 2021.