Tragedy has struck the Brazilian MMA community.



MMA fighter Leandro "Feijao" Souza (5-5), a member of Nova Uniao and Delfim Cacadores, died on Thursday while cutting weight for Friday's Shooto Brazil 43 card in Rio de Janeiro. The 26-year-old fighter, who was slated to fight Gabriel Brasil (1-1) in flyweight action, was cutting the final two pounds for the official weigh-ins when he passed out, and his death was confirmed moments later.

"We are sad to report the death of Leandro Caetano de Souza," Shooto president Andre Pederneiras wrote on his Facebook page. "The athlete has passed away in Botafogo’s UPA. We don’t know the reasons why yet. We would like to express our condolences to all friends and family."

MMAFighting.com confirmed the news with Shooto officials, but there is still no information on the cause of the death.

"We don’t have much information yet," Feijao’s teammate Andre Santos told MMAFighting.com, "but we do know that is related to his weight cut. He’s my student but he also trains at Nova Uniao for about a year. I wasn’t with him during this process because I have a fight scheduled in Russia, so he spent the night at Nova Uniao’s gym. His sister called me saying that he had passed out so I went to the hospital, but he was already dead when I got there."