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Setting Sail Into Space, Propelled by Sunshine

Source: Dennis Overbye, "Setting Sail Into Space, Propelled by Sunshine," New York Times, November 9, 2009.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/science/space/10solar.html?pagewanted=1

Peter Pan would be so happy.

If the launching of LightSail-1 goes off according to plan next year, humans may soon be solar-sailing, as shown in this illustration. About a year from now, if all goes well, a box about the size of a loaf of bread will pop out of a rocket some 500 miles above the Earth. There in the vacuum it will unfurl four triangular sails as shiny as moonlight and only barely more substantial. Then it will slowly rise on a sunbeam and move across the stars.

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