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Flyby
<<How did they propose to drop the speed down from 80% C down to what would be needed to drop into orbit?>> 20% c. Not sure how you got within 20% c. 4.5 light years is about 22 years voyage, then 4.5 years back light travel time. So 27 years from launch we get the signal back. It’s a flyby, like New Horizons. New Horizons didn’t drop into Pluto/Charon orbit. It skipped on out and will be interstellar by and by. So the Hawking/Milner would be intergalactic, as 20% of c is well beyond Milky Way escape velocity. So the direction of travel places it outside the plane of the galaxy after about 8000 years, unless I messed my math. That’s actually faster by far than it would take either of the Voyagers or New Horizons to bridge the gulf to even the next closest star. I think 8000 years does get those craft out beyond our Oort Cloud, however.
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