4 ms·
It's just a question of funding. There's nothing that's needed to accelerate small enough probe on an escape trajectory at a few hundred km/s except plain old c
by Sharlin 2y ago
It's just a question of funding. There's nothing that's needed to accelerate small enough probe on an escape trajectory at a few hundred km/s except plain old chemical rockets with enough stages. If we can accelerate a >500 kg probe to 20 km/s, we can certainly use an extra stage with 400 kg of propellant to boost a 1 kg probe to much higher velocities.
And nobody talked about the next ten years. The GP said "fifty years", which is way too long a time span to have any certainty whatsoever as to what will happen. GP's assertion was 100% ludicrously overconfident.
- karaterobot 2y agoJust a note: I responded directly to a comment that said it could be built with today's tech, let alone 10, 20, or 50 years.