There is so many methods to what is done with our bodies after death. You can have your ashes spread after cremation, cryogenically frozen, natural burials in a basket without embalming, or just a regular burial. But crashing a spaceship into the Moon with your remains? Well, that is a first. Video by Generations Found YouTube about burial.
On July 18,1997, the world lost the famous planetary geologist Eugene Shoemaker. He was killed in a car accident in Alice Springs, Australia. His wife Carolyn Shoemaker (2021), who is also a scientist, was with him in the car and was injured.
The Shoemakers are best known for co-discovering with David Levy the Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9. The Comet made headlines when in 1994 it broke into pieces and crashed into Jupiter, leaving distinctive scars.
One of Eugene Shoemakers unfulfilled dreams was to go to the Moon. One year after his death, he got his wish. In a special tribute to the legendary scientist, part of his cremated remains (ashes) were taken to the Moon.
Shoemakers’ ashes were carried on the Lunar Prospector to the moon in a polycarbonate capsule. The capsule was one and three quarters inches long and seventh-tenths inch in diameter. The capsule was carried in a vacuum-sealed aluminum sleeve. Brass foil was wrapped around the capsule and inscribed with an image of Comet Hale-Bopp, an image of Meteor Crater in Northern Arizona, and a passage from William Shakespeare's enduring love story, "Romeo and Juliet". The capsule was placed deep inside the spacecraft.
Comet Hale-Bopp was inscribed on the capsule because it was visible to the naked eye in Australia during his fatal car crash. The Arizonan Meteor Crater inscription was because he helped provide the first conclusive evidence that Meteor Crater was indeed a meteor impact site and not an extinct volcano.
On January 5, 1998, the Lunar Prospector was launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida. Its one-year mission was to map the moon’s surface composition and look for possible deposits of polar ice, measure magnetic and gravity fields.
Once the spacecraft arrived, it was placed in orbit around the Moon. The orbit was about 63 miles above the lunar surface. The plan was to crash into the Moon once its battery died. With Shoemakers ashes onboard. See video on this famous burial.
The mission ended on July 31, 1999. Scientists deliberately crashed the Lunar Prospector into a perpetually shadowed area of a crater near the Moon’s South Pole. See more from Colorado Martini
Before the launch of the spacecraft, Carolyn Shoemaker was quoted as saying, "I don't think Gene ever dreamed his ashes would go to the moon…he would be thrilled." The Shoemakers' children and their spouses, as well as a sister and brother-in-law, were also in attendance. Carolyn, his family, and the world now know that when they look at the Moon, Eugene Shoemaker is truly the man on the Moon.
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