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Good Red Friday morning, Rallypoint, and welcome to the Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) for January 2, 2026. Could continuous pressure from sunlight provide a means of propulsion for future spacecraft? If so, that would minimize the need for carrying additional fuel needed for space travel. Glinting in the sunlight as it circled planet Earth in 2011, NanoSail-D2's solar sail was periodically bright and visible to the eye. What do you think...will we someday sail the heavens as we once did on the seas?
APOD: 2026 January 2 - NanoSail D2
Posted from apod.nasa.gov
Space
Science
Astronomy
Photography
Posted 18 d ago
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I read an abstract bout this subject a decade ago...and they thought they could get those sails up to a quarter of the speed of light. Tiny little sails pushed along by "light". Sadly, I don't think any current technology will let us Sail under the Cosmic Wind. Just to get to the Nearest Star...well, 44 years just to get there, and 44 four to get back. Nobody you knew when you left, would be still alive...and you would have some weird time dilation effects to work with.
Voyager would take almost 80,000 years to get there...and it is the furthest and fastest thing we have sent out ...as of now.
But the Nerds keep working on it. So maybe someday the giant Space Sails, will have intrepid explores as their crew...for truly long voyages.
Voyager would take almost 80,000 years to get there...and it is the furthest and fastest thing we have sent out ...as of now.
But the Nerds keep working on it. So maybe someday the giant Space Sails, will have intrepid explores as their crew...for truly long voyages.
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We may at some point, but I dont see how solar winds will drive a vehicle very fast comparable to engines.
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SGT Kevin Hughes
When you get time, you might want to read up on the engineering involved...for they can indeed, at least in theory, go way faster than any propulsion system. They have done some limited testing on both the materials and the "fuel", and it looks like they can hit 25% of the Speed of light...and maybe even 40%. Instead of making the sails genormous - they have made them tiny, but in big bunches.
And the solar wind, without our magnetic Field shielding us, would have stripped the surface of all life long ago.
And the solar wind, without our magnetic Field shielding us, would have stripped the surface of all life long ago.
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