Faithful readers of The Comet’s Curse will remember that Galahad uses cutting-edge solar sails to begin its voyage away from our solar system on its way toward the Earth-like planet of Eos.
But according to Canada’s CBC News, a space advocacy group called The Planetary Society (co-founded by the great scientific writer and thinker Carl Sagan) is planning to launch a real-life spacecraft into orbit using solar sails as early as next year. The group’s executive director says that in time, ships using solar sails could reach speeds of up to 100,000 miles per hour and could get out of the solar system in just five years.
In 2005, The Planetary Society launched a solar sail vessel called Cosmos-1, but the mission failed and the ship wound up in the ocean. Thanks in part to an anonymous $1 million donation, the organization has regrouped and re-tooled their design. Here’s hoping that this mission, planned for late 2010, goes off without a hitch.