Hitchhiking spaceship takes page out of Spider Man’s book
Posted by staff / September 8, 2015
One really fast way to get from point A to point B is to whip on the end of a rope, a la the amazing Spider Man, and that the simple idea could be how we start exploring the comets of the Kuiper Belt, just beyond Neptune.
According to Space.com:
Comet Hitchhiker would grab hold of an asteroid or comet using its harpoon, then let out some tether while applying a brake to capture kinetic energy from the target object. The probe could then land softly by reeling in the line, which would likely need to be 62 miles to 620 miles (100 to 1,000 kilometers) long in total.
Rapidly retrieving the tether (using the harvested kinetic energy) would accelerate Comet Hitchhiker away from the body and on toward its next target, all without the need for any kind of propellant, NASA officials said.
Though still in the earliest planning stages, in concept, this kind of craft could be a much faster form of space travel that would let us explore farther than ever before.
See, reading all those comic books as a kid can come in handy.
Full story at Space.com.
Photo credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornelius Dammrich, Graphics credit: Canva
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