Star Trek series creator Gene Roddenberry died in October 1991 - and, such was his love of all things space and sci-fi, he was sent into space posthumously. A portion of his Ashes were sent up into space in April 1997 in a Celestis spacecraft - along with the remains of 22 other people - from the Canary Islands. Its orbit deteriorated in May 2002 and burned up in the Earth's atmosphere, but Roddenberry's Ashes had been circling the planet for more than five years. The remainder of Roddenberry's ashes - along with those of his wife Majel, who died in 2008 - are scheduled to be launched into space in 2016.
NUFC editor for WhatCulture.com/NUFC. History graduate (University of Edinburgh) and NCTJ-trained journalist. I love sports, hopelessly following Newcastle United and Newcastle Falcons. My pastimes include watching and attending sports matches religiously, reading spy books and sampling ales.
