Sharing good content online isn’t always easy, as we prefer original (first-hand) content – contributed by our readers – that comes along with a permission to share these jewels. The following post first appeared in a Kenyan newspaper a month ago – we’ve tried contacting the editor in charge, but haven’t received a reply from them so far.
Still, the story is so unique, it needs to be shared:
Residents of Magomano village in Kiambu have been flocking to a homestead for a glimpse of a homemade helicopter which has been assembled by a 20 year-old farm hand.
Onesmus Mwangi started assembling the ‘helicopter’ seven months ago and has so far spent about Sh57, 000 which he started saving through Mpesa.
(…)
Mwangi said he has been buying plain sheets, boltsm filler, paint and sponge for fitting from a local supermarket.
“I bought metal bars and plastics locally and I have put an old chuff-cutter which mills animal feeds as the engine and propeller to move the wings.
The chopper weighs 25 kilograms.”The sheets are aluminum. I attempted to fly the chopper last week but it refused,” Mwangi said.”
The chopper has meanwhile been taken away by the local police “to ensure officers from the aviation sector verify whether it is fit for flying”. Right.
“If the government can educate me in engineering, I can come up with more innovations like a fast moving ship and more cohesive chopper than this one. Professionals should see whether they can improve on it.”
Full story is here!
Other objects of a certain aviational variety ex Africa include the Kahawa West Aircraft, Mubarak Abdullahi’s home-made helicopter in Nigeria, the homemade helicopter in Somaliland as well as this odd story on someone who claims to having built a single seater aircraft way back in the 1970s from an old VW Beetle engine.
Another form of “chopper” has been shared by Melissa Hogarth from South Africa:
(excuse the Comic Sans! 
)
“This inventive entrepreneur has taken vehicle wraps to another level!”, writes Melissa on FB.
Again – we contacted the original editors but haven’t received a reply. But since it was publicly shared on FB, we took the liberty to just repost it here.
And yes, copyright issues are important to us. Here at AfriGadget, we prefer our contributors to make use of one of the Creative Commons licences which often (not always) enable an easier sharing. AfriGadget is a group blog with no commercial interest, but we still prefer obtaining a permission to reshare the content you’ve put online.
Another part are missing stories. Often, we just have a photo and no story to come along with it. Photos or videos alone often do not tell the full story.
And here is another example:
A bicycle jeep (it seems) that was recently shared via the fabulous “Africa, this is why I live here” FB group. Photo credit: Lebohang Bucibo – that’s all we have!
