Sailing through space

Home News Tribune ^ | 01/01/07

[KevinDavis]

Just as boats can be powered using sails that catch the wind, spacecraft may someday be powered by solar sails. How would this work?

Remember, the Sun blasts out radiation all the time. Radiation includes the kind of light you can see and other kinds of light you cannot see.

Radiation that strikes a large, shiny, sail-like structure pushes on it, much as the wind pushes on a sail. Although the push is very gentle, it is constant. Over time, the spacecraft can get going very, very fast, using no fuel at all!

[Centurion2000]

If we could utilize a fast solar sailing technique to get there (wikipedia article), we can use an opposite approach to slow down for destination star systems we wish to study / explore.

Use nukes, it's much safer.