Despite Delay, Ashes of Star Trek's 'Scotty' to Launch Spaceward

As his family is momentarily distracted, James Doohan, known best for his role as chief engineer Scotty (Montgomery Scott) aboard the U.S.S Enterprise in the original Star Trek television series and seven films, holds a plaque aloft while accepting his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles Tuesday, Aug. 31, 2004. The 84-year-old Canadian suffers from Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, diabetes and lung fibrosis. (AP Photo/Nick Ut) CREDIT:

ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico (AP) - Beam me up, indeed!

James Doohan, who played chief engineer Montgomery "Scotty'' Scott in the original "Star Trek'' TV series and several movies, will have a few grams of his ashes blasted 70 miles (113 kilometers) into space this fall from southern New Mexico.

Houston-based Space Services Inc. plans to have the ashes of 100 others aboard the Oct. 21 "memorial spaceflight'' - among them, Gordon Cooper, one of the original seven Mercury astronauts.

Doohan died last July at age 85. His widow, Wende Doohan, said he would have wanted such a send-off.

"If the privatization of space was available when he was alive, he would have been first in line with a window-seat ticket,'' she told The Associated Press in a phone interview Tuesday. "It's a way to honor something he would have loved to have done.''

The 15-minute suborbital flight is scheduled to launch from the southern New Mexico site - future home of Spaceport America, which state officials hope will one day be a hub for space tourism.

"So far on that flight we have about 100 customers. But if I gave you a good guess, I'd expect it will be well over 100,'' Space Services spokeswoman Susan Schonfeld said Tuesday "Everybody wants to be on the same rocket as James Doohan. He was so beloved.''

The payload will be carried about 70 miles (113 kilometers) up before returning. Parachutes will then deploy to bring the ashes back to Earth. Customers pay between $495 (euro393) and $1,495 (euro1,187) to place remains of loved ones into an aluminum capsule and send them up.

The ashes of Doohan and Cooper had been scheduled for a launch in California this spring, but Schonfeld said a delay involving another rocket pushed back the company's schedule.

Another rocket carrying more of Doohan's ashes is slated for an orbital launch in December or January. Such flights deliver payloads to orbit, meaning the remains can be aloft for days, weeks or even years before falling back to Earth and burning up in the atmosphere.