BBC link, paper. They found five rocky planets orbiting Tau Ceti, which is a star very similar to our sun and only twelve lightyears away. One of the planets is in the zone where liquid water should exist. We need to claim it before the Romulans do.
All we need is .5 the speed of light and we are there in no time. LOL Ah well, so close but yet so far.
Change 'Romulans' to 'Chinese' and Washington might actually care enough to have NASA take a look at the idea. (Not that NASA scientists aren't already...)
In terms of the recent National Geographic special on how to get there: Evacuate Earth http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/channel/episodes/evacuate-earth/ http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2196/1 Some thoughts: http://www.trekbbs.com/showpost.php?p=7340005&postcount=22 The world ship called HORIZON is very similar to what is on the cover here http://www.bis-space.com/products-p...azine/spaceflight-vol-53-no-11-november-2011/ http://www.bis-space.com/2011/03/16/1514/call-for-papers-world-ships-the-long-journey-to-the-stars http://up-ship.com/blog/?p=11187 The Jan 2013 issues of Scientific American and National Geographic have nice artwork on the subject: http://www.scientificamerican.com/a...multi-generational-space-exploration-missions www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=darwin-in-space-how-multigeneration-12-12-18 http://shop.taviscoburn.com/ Also featured is Project Hyperion by Stever Summerford. Big 33 page PDF: http://www.steve-summerford.com/Colonized_Interstellar_Vessel.pdf http://news.discovery.com/space/icarus-interstellar-project-hyperion-worldship-120710.html http://press.nationalgeographic.com/2012/12/12/magazine-january-201/ www.martiniere.com/environments/ http://www.thefancy.com/things/258758690327239747/Artist%27s-Rendering%2C-Interstellar-Travel-Vessel-|-Stephan-Martiniere-for-National-Geographic More on the worldship: http://up-ship.com/blog/?p=7249 http://up-ship.com/blog/?p=7229 http://up-ship.com/blog/?p=11187
I could see our first mission there meeting later missions that beat them there with faster ships developed after they left.
Haha, that would kind of suck. But still better to arrive late on your sleeper ship than not at all because the FTL ships were not developed within your non stasis lifetime.
That happened in a sci-fi book I read just about. The main antagonist goes into cold sleep, arrives at the alien world only to find out that a human vessel launched a few months ago was right behind them.