Fulfilling her final wishes, Celeste Ready of Ocala, Florida had the cremated remains of her mother, Myrna Lou Clemons (49) sent to the heavens in a four foot helium-filled balloon earlier today. Fascinated with space and flight, it was Myrna Lu's wish to be sent up with one of the N.A.S.A. f

A balloon with the cremated remains of Adrienne Brier is released over the Gulf of Mexico during a ceremony led by her husband Gil Brier. They stood in the late afternoon heat on the low placid shore of the Gulf of Mexico. They were gathered under a full circle of bright sky scattered with la

It was as calm and picture perfect a day as one could hope for. A warm breeze blew through the morning air, leaving no reminder of the strong winds and vicious storm that ravaged central Florida only a day before. All that seemed a distant memory when the family of Harold Sherman gathered at Lake Di

For her 60th birthday, Diane Rhodes' friends today will keep their promise to give her a ride in a limousine. And they will follow that with another gift - scattering her ashes at 26,000 feet. Before she died in September, the Altamonte Springs woman told her friends that she desperately want

April 23, 2003 brought with it sunshine and blue skies, but even the beutiful weather couldn't mask the fact that a young man's life was taken so suddenly from us. And as the crowd gathered at Pine Island Beach in Hernando County it soon became apparent just how many lives were touched by th

Thursday dawned cloudy and fog-shrouded, as if to emphasize the gravity of putting a special friend to rest. For Rose Burgin, caretaker of many special friends, it was not the first time she had said goodbye to one of them. But it was the first time she had ever commended one to the heavens. T

Joanie West is full of sweet anecdotes: chattering dolphins appearing at a ceremony for a Navy test pilot who studied them; a stormy sky opening up just long enough to release a 49 year old woman who died of emphysema. The story that stays the same is that her balloons always fly, carrying with t

More people are shopping for cremations with unique final destinations for themselves, their loved ones and even their pets. Cremation - now the choice of 28 percent of Americans and nearly 50 percent of Floridians - has been gaining on traditional burial for three decades. Ashes are being packed in

Some of the most successful businesses in the world today started with a single idea coming out in conversation. So it is with Eternal Ascent Society. While having a talk with her husband Clyde about funeral preparations, Joanie West asked him about his wishes for that time. He told her he would lik

Eternal Ascent Society, Crystal River, Florida, has announced that attendees at this years' NFDA Convention in Nashville will be able to purchase a License to offer its' patented process for the scattering of cremated remains by releasing them in a giant (5-foot diameter) balloon at a substa

Picture subtitles: The balloon can be released at any site meaningful to the departed and his family. A family sends their Loved One on a final flight to the Heavens Eternal Ascent Society, Crystal River, Florida, is pleased to announce that David Heinz of Heinz Funeral Home in Inverness, Florida