NASA comes up with a consolation prize:
Colbert received more than 230,000 votes out of 1 million, but NASA reserved the right to be the final arbiter.
While it wasn’t the leading vote-getter, Tranquility was one of the top 10 suggestions submitted by respondents to the online poll, which ended March 20, NASA said in a statement. It was selected in part because of a connection to the 1969 first manned lunar landing.
“Apollo 11 landed on the moon at the Sea of Tranquility 40 years ago this July,” said William Gerstenmaier, NASA’s associate administrator for space operations. “We selected Tranquility because it ties it to the exploration and the moon, and symbolizes the spirit of international cooperation embodied by the space station.”
As a consolation prize to the comedian, Gerstenmaier said NASA is naming “its new space station treadmill the Combined Operational Load Bearing External Resistance Treadmill, or COLBERT.”
I’m sure this has been great publicity for NASA and they love it.