‘Star Trek’ legend Nichelle Nichols is heading back to space with several of her Enterprise crewmates … part of an incredibly fitting mission to put their remains into orbit.
Nichelle, who starred as Lieutenant Uhura and passed away back in July, will have her ashes added to the payload of a Vulcan rocket launching later this year for the moon and beyond.
United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan Centaur mission will first deliver a robotic lunar lander — to scout for NASA’s future Artemis flights to the moon — but then it will continue deeper into the solar system for the ‘Star Trek’ tribute.
The rocket will deliver Nichelle’s remains — as well as ‘Star Trek’ creator Gene Roddenberry, James Doohan (“Scotty”) and Majel Barrett Roddenberry (“Nurse Chapel”) — into a so-called “graveyard orbit” around the sun.
As for the fact, the ‘Trek’ greats’ final flight will be on a “Vulcan” rocket ship — Nichelle’s son, Kyle Johnson, says “I’m sure she would have much preferred to go on the shuttle, but this was a pretty close second.”
Hey, Dr. Spock’s smiling somewhere.