SPOKANE, Wash. -- If you follow former NFL star and Spokane native Steve Gleason on Twitter, you may have noticed his obsession with space.
Gleason and his son Rivers are often pictured perched together with their eyes on the sky.
“Steve's always had a fascination with the universe. I mean you can see just by all the tweets about the moon it's something that's special for him and Rivers," Assistant Executive Director of Team Gleason Blair Casey said.
Casey notes adventure has always been important to Gleason, which is why Team Gleason brings ALS patients on adventures of a lifetime, including the top of Machu Pichu. When Casey went to Gleason to talk about the next phase of Team Gleason's adventure program, he was not entirely shocked.
"In that conversation, Steve paused for a little bit and he's like, ‘I want to send somebody to space and I want to go’ and of course we're like, ‘Oh geez, here we go,’" Casey said.
Gleason created a video application to "Space for Humanity". It is a non-profit group that plans on selecting a group of non-astronauts for an all-expense paid journey to view the Earth from Space. Gleason said the video with the most likes on YouTube advances in the process. His ultimate dream is to take another ALS patient along for the ride.
"I know Steve is very adamant and I think if anybody can do it, it's Steve Gleason. Steve's going to space," Casey said with a laugh.
Gleason is hoping to get at least 5,000 likes on his YouTube Space for Humanity video application by Friday. As of Tuesday, he has more than 1,000.
