Want to spend eternity going in circles around the Earth? There's a business for that.
For those desiring a place in the stars for all of eternity, space is now truly the final frontier.
In a growing celestial trend, there are a handful of firms that will catapult a small bit of cremated ashes into the great beyond onboard a rocketship that blasts off from sites including Florida's Cape Canaverel.
And as with Earthbound travel, the farther you go, the more it costs.
There are several travel itineraries to choose from. The moderately priced "Earth Rise Service" offered by Celestis, Inc., launches ashes or DNA samples into the heavens for several minutes, as a space capsule "floats freely over Earth, among the stars," the company promises on its website.
Prices begin at $2,995 and feature services including a three-day memorial service, a certificate authenticating the space journey and a helicopter that will pick up the remains when they fall back to Earth.
Love someone to the moon and back? You can send the remains of a loved one there, with services beginning at $12,995. Celstis says its third lunar launch will blast off sometime in March.
In the new year, the company will fly the ashes of more than 150 people, including “Star Trek” creator Gene Roddenberry and actor James Doohan who portrayed "Scotty," into space from Cape Canaverel.
Some of the ashes of Roddenberry, who died in 1991, will be accompanied by remains of his wife, Majel, who died in 2008.
Company co-founder Charles Chafer said he had promised Roddenberry's widow that one day he would send the couple's remains into space.
Also onboard will be “authenticated DNA” from the hair samples of former U.S. presidents George Washington, Dwight Eisenhower and John Kennedy.
The genetic information could be a roadmap for scientists far, far into the future, the company said in a statement this year while announcing the flight.
"DNA storage allows the human genome to be preserved for thousands of years in space without degradation," the company said. "This means it is possible it could be discovered later, like a cosmic time capsule."
Part of the package for sending a loved one into permanent orbit around the Earth includes a satellite tracker, which alerts the holder when the space vessel passes. Also included is a launch ceremony, where mourners can watch the vessel blast off.
“Seeing any rocket launch is a pretty emotional experience,” Chafer told BuzzFeed News earlier this year.
“But if you’re seeing it ... you know, ‘Hey, Mom’s on that, and she’s going to orbit, and I’ll know every night about what time she’s going overhead so I can say hello to her,'" Chafer said of the experience, which he called "lighting the biggest candle on Earth.
"What I tell people is you don’t see so much high-fiving and cheering at any funeral service as you do at ours,” Chafer said.
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