During research StarMy new book on the realities of Interstellar tripI have often been surprised by the bizarre conceptions of exaggerated spaceship that scientists have proposed in renowned university journals. The best known of them is Project Orion (1957-1965)whose central idea was to propel an interstellar spacecraft by exploding a series of thermonuclear bombs behind it, which gives the machine a succession of powerful kicks through space.
Long after the end of the project, Freeman Dyson, who worked on the project, said: “We were really a little crazy, thinking that all these things would work.” Amen.
