The Astronaut Dream Was Dashed

The astronaut dream was dashed when Rush learned that his eyesight wasn't good enough for him to become a military pilot in the 1980s. Still he dreamed of going to space, perhaps as a passenger on one of the private rockets being developed in the early 2000s by the likes of Richard Branson. In fact, Rush traveled to the Mojave Desert in 2004 to watch the launch of Spaceship 1, the first commercial craft sent into space. When Branson stood on its wing and declared that a new era of space tourism had arrived, Rush says: "I had this epiphany"