Late Astronauts Fly In Space Without Medical Certificate

What is behind the bizarre practice of launching capsules containing
the burnt human remains of celebrities into space? Isn't this
ghoulish practice just a bit beneath the dignity of science?




http://www.spacetoday.org/SolSys/Moo...rospector.html
Ashes of a "Great Founder" On Board

NASA placed an ounce of the cremated remains of a man NASA scientists
called a "great founder" of planetary science aboard Lunar Prospector.
The ashes are the remains of Eugene Shoemaker who was a co-discoverer
of Shoemaker-Levy 9, a comet that crashed into Jupiter in 1995.


http://66.218.69.11/search/cache?p=p...icp=1&.intl=us
December 2

Late Mercury Astronaut to Make Third, Final Flight

Susan Cooper, the widow of Mercury astronaut Gordon "Gordo" Cooper who
died in October 2004, said Thursday that her husband's ashes will be
included in the memorial payload to be launched on-board a commercial
expendable rocket scheduled for no earlier than March 2006, Alan Boyle
with MSNBC.com reported.

"In life, Gordon would have taken another trip into space... so I
figured, why not now?" Cooper told Boyle.

The launch was arranged by Space Services, a company co-founded by
Cooper's fellow Mercury astronaut Donald "Deke" Slayton specializing
in "post-cremation memorial spaceflights."

Cooper's remains will be carried spaceward on the Falcon 1, a yet-to-
be space tested launch vehicle built by Space Exploration Technologies
(SpaceX), along with a Pentagon satellite and the ashes of more than
170 people including actor James "Scotty" Doohan of Star Trek fame.


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10283728
Susan Cooper said her husband never mentioned having his ashes flown
into space "per se," but he was good friends with Mercury colleague
Deke Slayton, who was one of the founders of Space Services Inc. She
said she decided having Space Services send some of Cooper's ashes
into space would be an appropriate tribute.

Space Services spokeswoman Susan Schonfeld said Gordon Cooper would be
the first astronaut to have his remains launched into space. However,
he is by no means the first person with space connections to be
memorialized in this way: "Star Trek" creator Gene Roddenberry's ashes
went up on a previous flight, and Space Services also assisted with
the arrangements to have astronomer-geologist Gene Shoemaker's ashes
included on NASA's Lunar Prospector probe, which orbited the moon
until its lunar crash landing in 1999.



http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/...n1044692.shtml
Scotty Tributes To Blast Off Too

TORONTO, Nov. 15, 2005

(AP) When Scotty's ashes head for orbit next year, his fans can send
their best wishes along for the ride.

James Doohan, who played chief engineer Montgomery Scott of the
Starship Enterprise in the original "Star Trek" TV series and
subsequent movies, died at his Redmond, Wash., home in July at age 85.
The Vancouver, British Columbia-born actor had told relatives he
wanted his ashes blasted into outer space, as was done for "Star Trek"
creator Gene Roddenberry.

Some of Doohan's ashes will be launched some time in February or March
from California's Vandenberg Air Force Base, said Susan Schonfeld, a
spokeswoman for Houston-based Space Services Inc., which has been
arranging memorial space flights for several years.

Details will be posted online at www.spaceservicesinc.com — where
Scotty's ...


http://www.space.com/spacenews/archi...ch_042104.html
SpaceX has also agreed to launch a much smaller payload for Chafer on
the Falcon’s debut launch — a small canister of cremated human
remains. The ashes are being flown as part of Chafer’s Celestis space
burial service which has been launching cremated remains into orbit
since 1998.



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