Vic father wins ticket on Virgin Galactic into space
A Melbourne father-of-two is over the moon after winning a competition to go into space.
Scott Copeland will finally get to fulfill his childhood dream to become an astronaut, and will be one of the first to fly on Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic spaceship.
"I spoke to my teacher and said I wanted to be an astronaut, and she laughed and said 'you'll have to get a real job'," he said.
He has now proved her wrong.
Scott won the Velocity Frequent Flyer ultimate flight upgrade competition, via Virgin Australia - the prize was the ultimate upgrade into space.
"I'll be a certified astronaut," he said.
"There's only been 700 in history, so I'll be adding one more to that tally."
To beat the thousands who entered, Scott even tracked down that grade five teacher, who had called his dream impossible, to tell her he would be heading into space.
"After 34 years, I sat down with her and talked about that conversation," he said.
After four days of zero-gravity training, the ANZ risk management worker will spend two-and-a-half hours on board the Virgin Galactic spaceship next year.
"The kids asked if they could come but half a million dollars to get them on board would be a bit of a stretch."
