xkcd Determines How Long It Would Take to Visit All 50 States in the United States

In the latest edition of “What If?” by xkcd, Randall Munroe addresses an article from Data Pointed determining how quickly an individual could potentially travel to all 50 states in the United States. Suffice it to say, Munroe’s own answer becomes decidedly more complicated.

If you allow the satellite to change course an unlimited number of times, it can just forget about orbits completely, following a twisty course that stays over the US. At that point, it simply becomes a question of how much fuel you’re allowing it to have.

image via xkcd