NASA's NanoSail-D Helps Promise Solar Sailing Ships

NanoSail-D, a small, solar sail,has unexpectedly ejected from the FASTSAT satellite, over a month after it was scheduled to. Now NASA is calling upon ham radio operators to confirm that NanoSail-D has deployed properly and is working.

NanoSail-D is about the size of a breadbox and massing 4.5 kilograms and the sails, if properly deployed on four extended booms, will be a hundred square feet. If successful, NanoSail-D will be the second vehicle to fly in space propelled by sunlight. The first, Ikaros, was launched by Japan in June, 2010.

Solar sails workby catching light particles from the sun on a reflective surface. Just like a regular sail boat propelled by the wind on Earth's oceans, a solar sailor would fly through the inner solar system propelled by the light of the sun. Beyond the orbit of Mars, a solar sailor would likely not be useful because of the dimness and distance of the sun.

Space visionaries imagine space craft, propelled by solar sails, voyaging, say, between Earth and Mars. The sails would be anywhere from the size of a football field to miles in diameter. Space ships with solar sails would be like the galleons or clippers of previous centuries, only flying the airless sea of space rather than the bounding ocean.

Ships with solar sails do not require rocket fuel and would accelerate constantly, slowly building up speed across great distances. They would decelerate the same way, shifting sails to use sunlight to slow down as they approached their destination. Solar Sailing ships could be used to move cargo to resupply Mars explorers, for example.

Solar sailing ships have been a stable of science fiction. Both Arthur C. Clarke and Poul Anderson wrote stories about solar sailing ships around the same time, ironically both entitled"Sunjammer." Solar sail ships were used in an episode of"Star Trek: Deep Space 9", in the film"Star Wars: The Attack of the Clones", in the James Cameron film"Avatar."

Some scientists envision solar sail ships being accelerated by a massive laser, sending it to hitherto unimaginable speeds to take it to the outer Solar System or even to other solar systems. Another idea for solar sailing star ships would be for the ship to accelerate while spiraling away from the Sun until it reaches solar escape velocity and then, when approaching the target star, decelerate in the same way.

Mark R. Whittington is the author of Children of Apollo and The Last Moonwalker. He has written on space subjects for a variety of periodicals, including The Houston Chronicle, The Washington Post, USA Today, the LA Times, and The Weekly Standard.

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