Family, friends, colleagues and students gathered at a special ceremony to dedicate a memorial bench to Southampton academic Dr Angelo Grubisic who died by misadventure in a flying accident in Saudi Arabia in 2019.
Angelo, 38, was a well-respected and much-liked Lecturer in Aeronautics and Advanced Propulsion at Southampton. His goal was to break world records for flying as far, as fast, for as long and from as high an altitude as possible in a wingsuit, an aerodynamic overall with fabric wings at the arms. He leapt from mountains or aircraft to glide toward the ground before deploying his parachute. Wingsuit-flying and base jumping were Angelo’s passions. He was described as ‘Rocket Man’ or ‘Jet Man’ for his stunts in which he took off and flew James Bond-style in a suit powered by jet engines on his arms and back.
The memorial bench is situated in Engineering Square, near to his office and where he gave many lectures. It will provide a place for people to sit and remember him or just to gather and chat.
During the ceremony, former colleagues and students recalled their memories of Angelo and the inspiration and passion he gave to all that he did.
His colleague Professor Bharathram Ganapathisubramani said: “We wanted to provide a lasting memorial to Angelo who was very popular and supportive to his students and colleagues. He was a great colleague, full of energy and passion. He impressed us with his passion for Aerospace Propulsion and his ability to convey that passion to his undergraduate and postgraduate students. He was taken far too soon.”
Angelo specialised in the development and testing of advanced propulsion systems for spacecraft in support of the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA. He was a consulting engineer for the ESA during its BepiColombo mission to Mercury, a joint project with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency using two satellites that are due to reach Mercury’s orbit in 2025. He was also a consultant to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, which is involved in exploration research on Mars, including probing the possibility of life on the Red Planet.
