Bruce McCandless II, born June 8, 1937 in Boston, Massachusetts, went into space twice. He graduated from the US Naval Academy in 1958, and received flight training from the Naval Air Training Command in Pensacola, Florida and in Kingsville, Texas.
He was selected as an astronaut in the NASA Astronaut Group 5 at age 28, the youngest member of the group. He served as mission control capsule communicator (CAPCOM) during Apollo 11. He served as CAPCOM for Apollo 14, as well as astronaut support crew. He was reassigned to the Skylab program, serving as CAPCOM for Skylab 3 and Skylab 4.
His first mission was aboard Space Shuttle Challenger (STS-41-B) as mission specialist in February 1984. During the mission he performed the first untethered spacewalk, using the Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU), traveling 322 ft away from the shuttle. He spent eight days in space.
His second mission was aboard Discovery (STS-31) as mission specialist in April 1990. He was planning to conduct an EVA with fellow astronaut Kathryn Sullivan to fix and array that could not be deployed through ground control, but the problem was fixed without the need of an EVA. He returned to Earth after 5 days in space.
McCandless passed away in December 2017.
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