Lakeway couple plans space wedding
They're spending plenty, but is it legal?
American-Statesman, May 21, 2007
Patrick Beach
LAKEWAY The idea for Cindy Cashman's wedding came to her out of thin air, so, naturally, that's where she and her fiancé, Mitch Walling, will do the deed.
If all proceeds as expected, Cashman and Walling will travel to Oklahoma in a couple of years, board a private aircraft operated by space tourism company Rocketplane Inc. and become the first couple to be married in space.
Cindy Cashman and Mitch Walling aim to be the first couple married in space when they hope to fly on the maiden voyage of a ship launched by a private Oklahoma company in 2009. The cost is expensive, but the couple have the money to spend.
For Cindy Cashman's wedding to Mitch Walling aboard the Rocketplane XP, she wants to have a 'worldwide contest' to design her dress, to be made of lightweight, fire-resistant Nomex. A videographer will capture the 30-second vows, possibly for a reality show.
Only makes sense. As Cashman points out, they met in cyberspace. And who hasn't wanted to shoot his or her new spouse into space now and then anyway?
By now, you're thinking, "What specific type of lunatic is this person?"
Suffice to say Cashman, a speaker, author and entrepreneur, thinks, as they liked to say back in the '90s, "outside the box" and looks beyond what's immediately available.
For instance, when the idea came to her in May 2005 while meditating, she didn't just need a rocket.
She needed a boyfriend.
So she hooked up with Match.com, an Internet dating site. After 33 dates in a year "interviews," she calls them she knew Walling was it, and they settled into an exclusive relationship.
Two months into their courtship, Walling, a pilot for American Eagle airlines for not quite 20 years, asked Cashman to marry him as the two were on a motorcycle going 70 mph on the way to Cashman's Lakeway home from Spicewood.
A couple of weeks later, she said, "By the way, honey, I'd like to get married in space."
Walling gave her a look that said, "Yeah, right."
After doing a good bit of research, Cashman settled on Rocketplane, which was incorporated in 2001 and plans to start test flights in late 2008 or early 2009. After 25 such flights, the company plans to start taking tourists where only a handful of humans have gone before at $250,000 per person. Cashman and Walling have paid a deposit and are scheduled for the second or third flight, sometime in '09.
If this is a fly-by-night venture, they've fooled NASA. Rocketplane has two divisions: Rocketplane Global Inc., which will offer suborbital flights, and Rocketplane Kistler Inc., which is developing reusable space transportation systems. Rocketplane Kistler got half of the $500 million the space agency is spending through 2010 to develop delivery services for the international space station.
This is what Cashman and Walling expect will happen:
The Rocketplane XP takes off from the spaceport like a normal jet. After ascending for about 15 minutes to 40,000 feet, the pilot lights the rocket engine and pulls the craft into a steep, nearly vertical climb for a little more than a minute, speeding into the suborbital atmosphere at more than 3,500 feet per second. Once the engine is cut, at more than 300,000 feet, Cashman and Waller are weightless, a sensation many a bride and groom have reported.
Walling will be wearing a Nomex flight suit with nine pockets ("for barf bags," he says), and Cashman plans a "worldwide contest" to design her wedding dress. It'll be Nomex, too. They've timed their vows to about 30 seconds.
An officiant will be on hand as well as a videographer, possibly from a reality show. (Yes, they're looking to make a big deal out of this.) Then they'll have roughly four minutes of weightlessness to look out the window and generally congratulate themselves on having the awesomest wedding ever. Except?
"They would not be considered married persons."
That is according to Austin aviation lawyer and total buzzkill Mike Slack, who in a past life worked on the space shuttle program.
Slack consulted with family lawyer Martin Boozer, and this is their position:
"Whatever happens on this space trip is not going to have a legal effect on marital status," Slack said. "They are not getting married in space. There is no body of law or jurisdiction that exists in space to confer recognition on a marriage ceremony."
So, in other words, these two could spend half a mil to get hitched and then not be able to open a terrestrial joint checking account? Space travel is by nature insanely dangerous, and now, at least for Cashman and Walling, it doesn't even get them what they want?
Sounds like we need an official position to settle this thing.
"I spoke with our district judge, and he said that's really not for us to decide," said Jan Digby, the deputy clerk of court in Beckham County, Okla., where Cashman and Waller will have their license issued. "It's not for us to determine whether it would be legal or not."
(Incidentally, a marriage license is $50 in Oklahoma but only $5 if you provide proof that you and your undying sweetness have had premarital counseling.)
Because she is that way, Cashman has thought of this issue. And if Beckham County gives them a marriage license, they're married, she says.
On top of that, according to Rocketplane's George French III, "Our pilot is a Navy captain, and Navy captains are sanctioned to conduct marriages, so it's a little loophole."
Again, not to tinkle in the wedding reception punch, but it appears that the long-held belief that ship's captains can perform weddings may be, well, a myth. But generally speaking, courts have ruled that if couples say vows and think they're married, they're married.
Cashman, 48, remains upbeat and unperturbed.
"It's a big deal to us that it's legal," she said. "I went through a lot, my attorney went through a lot, and in my opinion, it'll be legal. This is history. This is the ultimate adventure. I didn't know this was going to be possible in my lifetime. Is this the American dream or what?"
"It's going to be a wild ride," Walling, 55, said with a big grin.
But they'll have to wait. When asked where the company's rocket was in development, French, a business development associate at Rocketplane, said, "It's kind of hard to define. The design is very mature in engineering terms."
Meanwhile, you can track the couple's progress at www.first spacewedding.com.
No word on whether Cashman and Walling will serve Tang at the reception.
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