Update on Pioneer 10: First Exploratory Spacecraft Sent Out of Our Solar System

Update on Pioneer 10

She sighed. “That’s where your room is, Lars,” Dad said. “The far left window on the second floor—the one with the light on.” I glanced up. Someone was silhouetted in the window of what was to be my room. Whoever it was slowly raised one hand. It reminded me of the picture sent on the Pioneer 10 space probe to greet the rest of the universe. “Is that Aunt Cass waving at us?” I asked.

 —The Riddle of Penncroft Farm © 1989 by Dorothea Jensen

I wondered what was going on with  Pioneer 10 (if anything) these days. Below is what I found online from NASA. 

I’m sure that most readers of The Riddle of Penncroft Farm were born many years after the last signal came to earth from this first exploratory space craft. It was still big news when I first started writing that story in the early 1980s, however! 

PIONEER 10

Firsts:

First spacecraft placed on a trajectory to escape the solar system into interstellar space

First spacecraft to fly beyond Mars

First spacecraft to fly through the main asteroid belt

First spacecraft to fly past Jupiter

Crossed the orbit of Neptune to become the first human-made object to go beyond Neptune

First spacecraft to use all-nuclear electrical power

Dates:

March 2, 1972: Launch

July 15, 1972: Spacecraft entered the asteroid belt

Dec. 4, 1973: Pioneer 10’s closest approach to Jupiter

 Feb. 1976: Pioneer crossed Saturn’s orbit

June 13, 1983: Pioneer 10 crossed the orbit of Neptune

March 31, 1997: Routine contact with spacecraft terminated

Pioneers 10 and 11 both carried small metal plaques identifying their time and place of origin for the benefit of any other spacefarers that might find them in the future.

Pioneers 10 and 11 both carried small metal plaques identifying their time and place of origin for the benefit of any other spacefarers that might find them in the future.