a spacecraft using a solar sail as its chief method of propulsion
One moment I was over old New York, aiming toward the updrafts in Wall Street Valley…. But there's a town to the west.…. I’d never seen a town like that and I’ve flown all around New York and beyond in my sail-ship.]
She went by light-sail ship. And she had to cross space—space, where the danger always waits.]
The messages which drew a herdship off her path had always been automatic: beeps from a sailship whose interior sensors had registered trouble.
It selected a fertilized human embryo, tagged it with the freakish name ‘Elaine,’ irradiated the genetic code with strong aptitudes for witchcraft and then marked the person’s card for training in medicine, transportation by sailship to Fomalhaut III and release for service on the planet.
She had not minded trading hunting grounds for sailship cubicles: the universe lay waiting. She entered the ship young and eager.
‘Yes. A sailship,’ Albert agreed. ‘A photonic spacecraft. Its only propulsion is from light pressure against the array of sails.’
Twenty days in a sailship is a long time.
The Pethesilean mining vessel was a sailship. Propelled by the pressure upon their light[-]reflective sails of photons broadcast from laser arrays in orbit around stars, they are able to reach speeds approaching half the speed of light in one-point-six years.
antedating 1964
Last modified 2021-04-01 13:46:13
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