Could a 21st Century USS Enterprise Really Fly?

A model of the USS Enterprise. Image: Louie Kenny/Flickr

Only an imagination made of stone could fail to stir at the thought of a real-world USS Enterprise blasting away from Earth within 20 years, reaching Mars in three months and restoring a sense of epic grandeur to mankind’s spacefaring dreams.

But is that vision, which went viral thanks to the detailed blueprints of an anonymous self-described engineer known only as BTE Dan, actually possible? Trillion-dollar price tag aside, could this 21st century interpretation of the Enterprise boldly go where no one has gone before?

Read More: http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/05/bte-dan-enterprise/