The Greater Green River Intergalactic Spaceport in the US state of Wyoming, although sounds fantastic, is actually a disappointing dirt landing strip located about 7 km south of the central business district of Green River, on a mountain known locally as South Hill. The so called ‘spaceport’ is equipped with a solitary runway, 1,700 meter long and 40 meters wide. Its dirt and gravel surface is covered by deep ruts from vehicular traffic. The runway is unattended and there are no buildings or facilities nearby. The only movement here is from a lone substandard windsock that gets picked up by the occasional gust of wind.

For decades, the runway was known as Green River 48U. Then in 1994, the Green River City Council adopted the spaceport moniker as a tourism stunt. The idea was to welcome inhabitants of Jupiter who might wish to take sanctuary in Green River, when their planet was threatened by collision from Comet Shoemaker–Levy 9. Surprisingly, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approved the name change.

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So far, there are no reports of out-of-this-world spacecraft, but the spaceport has drawn terrestrial humans. Since the renaming, pilots of small and experimental planes are reported to have practiced the maneuver of “touch and go” — in which the wheels touch the runway then return to the sky — just so they could log into flight books that they visited an intergalactic spaceport. The spaceport also draws teenagers who like to hang out on the runway and spin doughnuts with their cars.

The city is now looking forward to convert the spaceport into a proper airport to attract general aviation traffic that would, hopefully, boost tourism in the area.

Also see: Spaceport America in New Mexico

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The runway. Photo credit

Sources: Wikipedia / Casper Star-Tribune Online