Date: 2014-11-17 01:20 pm (UTC)
>an unmanned mission to get data, which was IMPOSSIBLE!
Not really. Please consult the link that I've mentioned before. It can be possible to communicate from inside the rotating black hole. So there were a chance that the robot would be able to transmit something, but there were also a bigger change that it would just be destroyed without much help.

>They were sitting there for hours
I'm not sure it's even possible to estimate if flushing engine with in-board air would help. Too many factors involved.

>he later planned the gravitational maneuver around the black hole IN SECONDS
It's more like he knew about Penrose process (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penrose_process). Actual trajectory planning would need to be made by computers anyway.
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