re: The thing is the size of a grapefruit with antennae sticking out of it
It’s not like going 18,000 miles per hour stopped us from rendezvousing with a spacecraft. They wouldn’t zip by and try to grab it on the fly. It’s called rendezvous. Relative velocities would be pretty much zero. Unless I’m missing something when it comes to highly eccentric orbits. I would figure that might make it more difficult, but not impossible. Why wait 150 years. All of us will all be dead then, and not able to enjoy the thrill of it. Let’s go get it as soon as we can.