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Nasa to build nuke spaceship to hunt aliens

NASA wants to build a nuclearpowered spaceship to meet aliens 25trillion miles away.

Space agency scientists hope to reach the nearest star in the Alpha Centuri system – where water and life may exist.

NASA wants to build a nuclear-powered spaceship to meet aliens in the so-called “Goldilocks Zone” where life could exist.

The US space agency’s experts reckon their supercraft could travel the 25trillion miles – or 4.37 light years – to the nearest star in the Alpha Centauri planetary system.

The “Goldilocks Zone” refers to the area around a star where the temperature is just right to contain liquid water. There they reckon the craft could discover habitable rocky planets and, hopefully, aliens.

But the probe would take 70,000 years to reach Alpha Centauri’s star, despite hitting speeds of 10 miles per second. The Helios probe is the fastest spacecraft so far launched into space, travelling at 155,000mph.

Speed

But even at that speed it would take 18,000 years to reach Alpha Centauri.

Nasa chiefs are now pushing the idea of a nuclear-powered craft that could cover the distance far more quickly.

Dr Thomas Zurbuchen, of Nasa’s Science Mission Directorate, said: “Nasa is not a space tourism company and we’re not the same agency that we were during the time of Apollo.

“We know there are planets there and we should be exploring them. It’s not going to be easy and we haven’t got it figured out yet. But that’s the direction we should be heading.

“It’s likely this would be a legacy project that we won’t see happen in our lifetime, but it’s something we should be thinking about and planning for.”

Nasa first suggested a mission to Alpha Centauri in 1987 but it was shelved.

The late Professor Stephen Hawking said in 2016 he would design a tiny nanocraft that could travel to the system within 20 years.