Earlier this month Valve’s Gabe Newell announced he – alongside Weta Workshop and Rocket Lab – would be launching a garden gnome into space for charity, with $1 being donated for everyone that watches.
And now the time has come to wave goodbye to Gnome Chompski, who is preparing for lift-off early tomorrow, 20th November, in the UK.
Chompski will be hitching a ride on Rocket Lab’s Flight 16, whose primary objective is to launch 30 satellites into a sun-synchronous orbit.
Newell’s recreation of Gnome Chompski’s Episode 2 adventure thankfully skips to the end, and will see the iconic garden ornament – actually a 6-inch titanium recreation of Chompski created by Weta Workshop, in this instance – blast into space at 2.44pm NZT/1.44am in the UK on 20th November, which equates to 8.44pm EST on 19th November.