As a teenager, Michael Clive remembers the long train ride he and his father took from their home in Maryland to Virginia to attend the first Mars Society meeting. Michael remembers watching his father talk excitedly to other space enthusiasts about the possibility of a future mission to Mars.
His son, now 39 and a resident of Castro Valley in Alameda County, said that when he dies, his father, Alan, will be closer than ever to his dream of a celestial journey.
Alan’s remains will be found at the inaugural launch of the highly anticipated Vulcan Centaur rocket, which will take off from Cape Canaveral, Fla., on Dec. 24. The remains and DNA samples of 338 people will be found on United Launch Alliance’s rocket. including some members of the original “Star Trek” TV series.
“He always found a way to exceed his own limits,” Clive said of his father. He said he was happy to help his father realize his dream by booking a seat for his funeral on the Tranquility flight.
Memorial spaceflights are owned by Texas-based Celestis Inc., which started spaceflights in 1997. are the distinguishing features of the company. Small capsules, ranging in size from “a lipstick case to a half-watch battery”, are excessively installed on commercial space flights. Capacity,” said Celestis co-founder and CEO Charles Chafer.
Like Celestis’ first mission carrying the remains of “Star Trek” creator Gene Roddenberry, this month’s launch will feature the remains of many people connected to the original TV series; these include Nichelle Nichols (who plays Lieutenant Uhura), Jackson DeForest Kelley. (portraying Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy) and James Doohan (portraying Lieutenant Commander Montgomery “Scotty” Scott).
According to Celestis’ website, the cost of launching a loved one’s remains into space can run up to $12,995 for a moon landing or launch into deep space.
The Dec. 24 launch marks the first time two commemorative flights — the Tranquility and the appropriately named Enterprise flight — have been added to the same rocket ship, Chafer said. The rocket will first send a lunar lander to conduct studies on the moon. Seventy capsules containing the debris will escort the lander to the moon’s surface.
“This becomes their ultimate memorial site,” Chafer said. “Everyone in the world can look up at night on a full moon and see where grandma is remembered.”
The rocket will then continue on its way as the spacecraft approaches approximately 100 million miles into orbit around the sun.
“This will be humanity’s most remote outpost,” Chafer said.
For years, Michael Clive had been waiting to fulfill his promise to build a space monument for his father.
Alan grew up in Detroit but spent most of his adulthood in the suburbs of Washington, DC. After losing his sight at age 22, Alan became a vocal advocate for disabled disaster victims, particularly during his 23-year career with the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Office of Equal Rights. But his true love always lasted.
Michael recalled that Alan would read his son stories from science fiction novels at bedtime, and they would take frequent trips to the National Air and Space Museum. Their favorite movie was “Apollo 13”, which Michael watched and described scenes to his father.
Alan died in 2008 after a 10-year battle with prostate cancer, Michael said. Shortly after his father’s death, Michael said he was inspired to switch from his career in film special effects in Hollywood to aviation. He took adult courses at Venice Beach High School to learn how to manufacture aerospace components and design his own rockets. Michael later began working for aerospace companies, including SpaceX, in and around the Los Angeles area.
“This was facilitated by his death,” Michael said of the role his father’s passing played in his decision to change careers. “He had no idea this was going to happen.”
The Enterprise flight will carry human remains into Earth orbit, as well as digital data such as original musical compositions. Chafer said satellites usually last about five years before “the laws of physics, gravity and solar activity force the spacecraft down to the very edge of the Earth’s atmosphere, where it disintegrates.”
“It’s designed this way so we don’t create space debris,” he said. “Basically dust to dust.”
While more commercial industries, including pharmaceuticals, are partnering on flights to space, Celestis has been selling space monuments for more than 20 years. Chafer said the Tranquility and Enterprise flights will be the company’s 19th and 20th flights, and the mission rate has increased in recent years.
Michael hopes the launch will coincide with clear skies and a full moon on December 24th. He plans to follow the rocket’s coordinates and point his telescope at the night sky when his father’s remains reach their final resting place.
With the speed of space travel, Michael considered the possibility that his daughters, 3-year-old Lyra, who loves rockets, or 7-month-old Maia, whose middle name is Alan after her grandfather, might one day get the chance to visit him. moon.
“Isn’t it weird to say that?” said. “It’s reasonable to think that someone in my family, such as my daughters or their granddaughter, will one day travel to the moon and visit her grave there.”
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This story was first published in the Los Angeles Times.