News: Sub-orbital flight set for small portion of Gordon Cooper's and James Doohan's ashes

Farmington-made rocket set to launch remains

By Abram Katz, Journal Register News Service
08/15/2006

http://www.bristolpress.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=17053945&BRD=1643&PAG=461&dept_id=10486&rfi=6

A few grams of an astronaut and an actor who played one on television
will get a brief taste of space this fall atop a Connecticut
company's solid-fuel rocket.

Gordon Cooper, who logged 222 hours in NASA's Mercury and Gemini
spacecraft, and James Doohan, chief engineer Montgomery "Scotty" Scott
of the Star Trek starship Enterprise -- a bit of what's left of them,
at least -- will inaugurate a new memorial flight service conducted
jointly by UP Aerospace Inc. of Farmington and Celestis Inc. of
Houston.

The flight, which will include the cremated remains of 118 additional
people, is scheduled for October.

Celestis, a division of Space Services, promises "a step into the
universe" for the deceased. The departed will lift off from the
"Spaceport America" south of Albuquerque.

However, the small capsules of ash will spend only around five minutes
about 140 miles above Earth before descending from the heavens on
parachutes for a soft landing 30 miles away on the White Sands Missile
Range.

They will ascend on a SpaceLoft XL launch vehicle designed and built by
UP Aerospace. SpaceLoft XL is shaped like a 10-inch diameter,
21-foot-tall knitting needle with fins, but its modest size is
deceiving.

The vehicle, powered by a 12,000-pound thrust engine, accelerates to
five times the speed of sound within 15 seconds after liftoff. The
craft reaches its suborbital apogee of 70 to 140 miles in about 2.5
minutes, said Eric Knight, chief executive officer of UP Aerospace and
co-designer of the rocket.

"We're the only company in the world providing access to space to the
public. We're like a small airlines," Knight said.

Universities, scientists, businesses and educators have put payloads
into space on previous launches. Other aerospace companies also rely on
the SpaceLoft XL to test new components, Knight said.

Payloads cannot exceed 110 pounds or 10,500 cubic inches. Four and
10-pound options are popular, he said, and can be launched for hundreds
of dollars.

UP Aerospace plans two launches in September, before the post-cremation
memorial flight.

Knight said UP Aerospace has no plans to launch the living. That would
require a larger, more complex launcher and generate high anxiety.

Charles Chafer, chief executive officer of Space Services and Celestis,
said, "With our Legacy Flights, the dream of spaceflight and the desire
to take part in the opening of the space frontier can be realized, and
available to everyone."

Legacy Flights start at $495.

Celestis also offers orbital, lunar and deep-space flights using larger
commercial launch services.

UP Aerospace envisions 12 launches next year, and 30 or more by 2008.
By then, the company hopes to have a rocket that can achieve Earth
orbit.

Engineers are working on that right now, Knight said.

Knight traces his interest in rocketry to 1964, when he and a cousin
began assembling and launching model rockets. The motor in SpaceLoft XL
is approximately equal to 65,000 model engines.

SpaceLoft XL was designed from scratch, he said. The vehicle
incorporates composites and other advanced materials. The engine is a
solid mixture of ammonium perchlorate and fuel, similar to the Space
Shuttle's solid rocket boosters.

The fuel is a hollow cylinder specially shaped and contoured to provide
optimal thrust levels as the motors burns, Knight said. "Designing took
years. It's a complex system. The laws of physics are the same for
everyone -- speed, stress, temperature," Knight said.

"It's rocket science, a very challenging thing. Every part has to
work perfectly," he said.

One of the advantages of solid fuel is relative simplicity of design.
SpaceLoft XL has virtually no moving parts. However, ensuring that the
fuel ignites evenly, from the top of the booster, is complicated,
Knight said.

The rocket is spin-stabilized by its fins, which can be adjusted to
rotate the vehicle between 1.5 to 6 times a second.

Two parachutes blossom on the way down, one each for the booster and
the avionics and payload. White Sands personnel track the rocket on
radar.

The whole trip, from lift-off to landing, takes about 30 minutes.

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