When Richard Garriott was one of the first private individuals to travel to the International Space Station in 2008, only a handful of people knew what he was Had luggage. He spent part of the ashes of actor James Doohan on the space station, fulfilling his and his family’s wishes.

Doohan played by 1966 to 1994 the chief engineer of the spaceship USS Enterprise Montgomery Scott in the television series Star Trek, in German Raumschiff Enterprise. The figure was better known under the nickname Scotty, which was mainly used by Captain Kirk: “Beam me up, Scotty” or in the German equivalent: “Scotty, beam me up.”

Beam me up, Scotty! James Doohan died in 2005 at the age of 85 years. Two official requests by the family to bring Doohan’s ashes to the ISS were denied. The 59 – year old private entrepreneur Garriott finally smuggled part of the remains on board during a twelve-day mission. He hid it along with a laminated photo of the actor in the Columbus module of the space station under a panel in the floor.

James Doohan’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame shortly after his death on 20. July 2005

(Image: AllyUnion, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

So far, the public did not know about the action. “His family was delighted that the ashes made it up there, but we were all disappointed that we couldn’t speak about it publicly for so long. Now it’s been enough time for us to do it,” Garriott told the British newspaper The Times. Chris Doohan, the actor’s son, thanked Garriott for his dedication. It would have meant a lot to his father.

It was not the first attempt to get the remains of James Doohan into space, but it was the first successful attempt. Also in the year 2008 part of its ashes started with the SpaceX Falcon 1 rocket. However, the start failed after a few minutes. In the year 2012 another launch including Doohan’s ashes with the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket succeeded. According to the Times, Doohan has meanwhile 70.000 Times circled and covered 2.7 billion kilometers.

(akr)