Megan Werner, 17-year-old pilot and founder of the U-Dream Global project, is back in South Africa following the death of her father in a plane crash in Tanzania this weekend.
According to a report by Netwerk 24, Megan is back home but too heartbroken to speak to anyone.
Des Werner and fellow project director Werner Froneman were killed while accompanying a group of South African teenagers who had built a four-seater Sling in 10 days to fly from Cape Town to Cairo.
The plane, which entered Tanzania’s airspace from Uganda on route to Malawi, made a distress signal about engine failure before disappearing from radar, according to the Tanzania Civil Aviation Authority (TCAA).
The Cape to Cairo Project
The ambitious aviation outreach project was developed by the U-Dream Global Foundation, a non-profit organisation that seeks to uplift and transform the lives of thousands of youth by encouraging them to dream and achieve the impossible.
The excursion, which started in June, saw different teams of 20 teen pilots fly a light aircraft from Cape Town to Cairo and back charting a course across Africa to visit towns and cities in Namibia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Tanzania, Kenya, Ethiopia, Eritrea to Egypt and a return trip that will include Uganda, Rwanda and Zambia.
The Sling-4 aircraft, which uses ordinary motor fuel, was built in only three weeks last year by the inexperienced teenagers in a highly controlled environment under the guidance and supervision of the Airplane Factory, U-Dream mentors and five team leaders from Denel Aviation.
Source: Netwerk24, EWN
