Space burial refers to the blasting of cremated remains into outer space. Missions may go into orbit around the Earth, to other planetary bodies (such as the Moon), or into deep space.
The cremated remains are not actually scattered in space, and thus do not contribute to space debris. Instead, the ashes remain sealed inside their spacecraft until the spacecraft either: re-enters the Earth's atmosphere and burns up upon re-entry (Earth orbit missions); reaches its final, extraterrestrial destination (e.g. the Moon); or escapes the solar system (deep space missions). To a lesser extent, suborbital flights provide the opportunity to briefly fly ashes into space and return them back to Earth for recovery. Only a sample of remains is launched so as to make the service affordable.
Private companies such as Celestis, Inc., Elysium Space, Ascending Memories, and Orbital Memorials offer space burial services.
Video Space burial
History and Typology
The concept of launching remains into space using conventional rockets was proposed by the science fiction author Neil R. Jones in the novella "The Jameson Satellite," which was published in the pulp magazine Amazing Stories in 1931. It was later proposed as a commercial service in the 1965 movie, "The Loved One," and by Richard DeGroot in a Seattle Times newspaper article on April 3, 1977. Since 1997, the private company Celestis has conducted numerous space burials flying as secondary payloads.
First Flights
The first space burial occurred in 1992 when the NASA space shuttle Columbia (mission STS-52) carried a portion of Gene Roddenberry's cremated remains into space and returned them to Earth.
The first private space burial, Celestis' Earthview 01: The Founders Flight, was launched on April 21, 1997. An aircraft, departing from the Canary Islands, carried a Pegasus rocket containing samples of the remains of 24 people to an altitude of 11 km (38,000 ft) above the Atlantic Ocean. The rocket then carried the remains into an elliptical orbit with an apogee of 578 km (359 mi) and a perigee of 551 km (342 mi), orbiting the Earth once every 96 minutes until reentry on May 20, 2002, northeast of Australia. Famous people on this flight included Gene Roddenberry and Timothy Leary.
Suborbital flights
While not technically spaceflights, these are sometimes counted among space burials. The remains do not burn up and are either recovered or lost.
Moon Burials
The first moon burial was that of Dr. Eugene Shoemaker, a portion of whose cremated remains were flown to the Moon by NASA. Shoemaker's former colleague Carolyn Porco, a University of Arizona professor, proposed and produced the tribute of having Shoemaker's ashes launched aboard the NASA's Lunar Prospector spacecraft. Ten days after Shoemaker's passing, Porco had the go-ahead from NASA administrators and delivered the ashes to the Lunar Prospector Mission Director Scott Hubbard at the NASA Ames Research Center. The ashes were accompanied by a piece of brass foil inscribed with an image of a Comet Hale-Bopp, an image of Meteor Crater in northern Arizona, and a passage from William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. The Lunar Prospector spacecraft was launched on January 6, 1998 and impacted the south polar region of the moon on July 31, 1999.
Upcoming missions are proposed by both Elysium Space and Celestis as part of an upcoming mission by Astrobotic Technology of Pittsburgh.
Pet Burials
In 2014, Celestis launched Celestis Pets, a pet memorial spaceflight service for animal cremated remains. Prior to then, a Monroe, Washington police dog may have flown on a 2012 memorial spaceflight. When this news broke, Celestis' President said that if dog ashes were on the rocket, the person who supplied the cremated remains likely violated the contract they signed with Celestis.
Dedicated Spacecraft
On May 17, 2017, Elysium Space announced the world's first memorial flight involving a dedicated spacecraft. The cubesat will be placed as a secondary payload on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket as part of a dedicated rideshare mission called SSO-A planned by Spaceflight. The launch will take place from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.
Maps Space burial
Spaceflight history
Orbital
Moon
Deep Space
Suborbital
Notable individuals buried in space
Launched into Earth orbit
- Gene Roddenberry (August 19, 1921 - October 24, 1991), creator of Star Trek.
- Gerard K. O'Neill (1927-1992), space physicist.
- Krafft Ehricke (1917-1984), rocket scientist.
- Timothy Leary (October 22, 1920 - May 31, 1996), American writer, psychologist, psychedelic drug advocate, and former Harvard professor.
- Charles Oren Bennett (January 21, 1928 - 1999), space illustrator.
- James Doohan, (March 3, 1920 - July 20, 2005), actor best known for his portrayal of Scotty in the television and film series Star Trek. Celestis also launched him into space in 2007 and in 2008.
- L. Gordon "Gordo" Cooper, Jr. (March 6, 1927 - October 4, 2004), American astronaut. He was one of the original Mercury Seven pilots in the Project Mercury program, the first manned space effort by the United States.
Buried on the Moon
- Dr. Eugene Shoemaker, (April 28, 1928 - July 18, 1997), astronomer and co-discoverer of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9.
Launched into outer space
- Clyde Tombaugh (February 4, 1906 - January 17, 1997), American astronomer and discoverer of Pluto in 1930. A small sample of Tombaugh's ashes are aboard New Horizons, the first spacecraft to attempt to pass by and photograph Pluto. This is the first sample of human cremated remains which will escape the solar system to travel among the stars.
Future space burials
- Leiji Matsumoto (1938~), Japanese creator of numerous celebrated anime and manga series including Galaxy Express 999, Space Battleship Yamato and Space Pirate Captain Harlock announced his intention to have a symbolic portion of his cremated remains to be launched into space on a future Elysium Space mission.
- Majel Barrett (1932-2008), American actress who played Christine Chapel in the original Star Trek series; wife of Gene Roddenberry. A symbolic portion of both her cremated remains and Roddenberry's cremated remains will be launched into space on a future Celestis mission.
- William Reid Pogue (1930-2014), American astronaut. and Luise Clayborn Kaish (1925-2013), American sculptor and painter.
References
External links
- Celestis Website
- Celestis Pets Website
- Elysium Space Website
- Ascending Memories Website
- The Real Elysium - Send Your Loved One Into Space for $2k, Pando Daily, August 9, 2013
- Have A Space Burial As Elysium Sends Your Ashes Into Orbit, TechCrunch, August 9, 2013
- Ash Scattering: Non-Traditional Ways To Be Memorialized, Huffington Post, May 25, 2012
- The Ultimate One-Way Ticket, Wired Magazine, February 21, 2006
- Death Is a Long, Strange Trip, Wired Magazine, November 7, 2006
- http://www.argosfuneralservices.com/ Argos Funeral Services Website]
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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