In brief: A small team of engineers and scientists have announced what they are describing as humanity's first mission to another star. It's an ambitious mission, but one that'd barely put a dent in the budgets of major space players like NASA or SpaceX.
The Fermi Explorer Mission aims to launch in just three years and arrive at Alpha Centauri in roughly 80,000 years at a cost of less than $15 million – an absolute bargain, relatively speaking. The non-profit is co-founded by Philip Johnston, Ezra Feilden, and Adi Oltean, who recently brought startup Starcloud to life. An 81-page PDF is available to download, outlining the full mission plan and analysis.
The team expects its spacecraft to be the first to set sail but the last to actually arrive at its destination. Advances in technology should allow humanity to build spacecraft in the not-too-distant future that can travel through space at much faster speeds. Even with the head start, Fermi Explorer will lose the race by a wide margin.
Why bother with the mission at all if craft built just 50 years from now will get there first? Well, someone has to be first, and the mission could spark interest from other groups with deeper pockets and better technology. There's also something to be said about the spirit of human exploration and our thirst for knowledge. A project like this certainly scratches those itches.
The non-profit is soliciting donations via a crowdfunding model, complete with typical reward tiers. A donation of $10 will get your name on a website as an official mission supporter, while a minimum contribution of $100 is needed for your name to be engraved on the craft. There's also a merch store where you can purchase branded swag to support the effort.
The next step in humanity's exploration of space involves returning humans to the Moon and eventually, sending them to Mars. A crewed mission to our nearby satellite is targeted for 2028; no date is yet set for our first trip to the Red Planet.