[wallace_f]

Might be possible, but the tensile strength required may be beyond our material science capabilities.

A harpoon impacting an object going 26km/s would experience something like 12,000gs even if you gave it a 1km-long buffer.

So your harpoon would have to be rocket-assisted. The problem now is how long does your need to be? The tensile strength to carry the weight of the tether itself may make this impossible.

[Cyphase]

> Might be possible, but ... may be beyond our material science capabilities.

Certainly, for now and a while to come.

[wallace_f]

Perhaps some ultra-lightweight probe using some sophisticated ultra-strong elastic tethers may be a way to accelerate an object at an orders of magnitude greater speed using asteroids as counter-weights. Probably nothing strong-enough, though.

[simooooo]

I think the twisting of the body may also cause problems for the tether.