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Re:Relativistic Spaceship by EA-3167 on Monday February 05, 2024 @09:55PM (#39270224)
When talking about how efficient a given reaction mass engine, such as a rocket, can be the unit is specific impulse in seconds. That unit represents how long a given engine carrying a given propellant can maintain 1g acceleration.

For context, the most powerful chemical rockets peak around 450s-530s. A nuclear rocket of the sort we can build today would be more than twice that value, and super-efficient ion thrusters can have IspS in the tens of thousands of seconds.

But we're talking about an engine with a specific impulse measured in decades, and as far as anyone knows that means having catastrophic amounts of antimatter. I don't think plucky explorers on a one-way trip are going to have access to a small moon's worth of antimatter, and if they did, imagine how many more interesting things they could do with it than fly to nowhere?

Re:Relativistic Spaceship by vl on Monday February 05, 2024 @11:43PM (#39270885)
>imagine how many more interesting things they could do with it than fly to nowhere?

Like what?

Re:Relativistic Spaceship by EA-3167 on Tuesday February 06, 2024 @11:50AM (#39276719)
Like power an entire planet for centuries, or use it as the energy budget for a megastructure project like a Dyson swarm.

We're talking about a truly incomprehensible amount of energy, not just to carry the rocket and its own fuel, but the tens of thousands of kg of water and food for even a modest compliment of people.

18 years is a LONG time after all.