From: Amara Graps (amara@amara.com)
Date: Wed Feb 26 2003 - 01:40:45 MST
Arrivederci !!!
http://abc.net.au/cgi-bin/common/printfriendly.pl?/science/news/stories/s793584.htm
News in Science 26/2/2003 Earth bids farewell to remote Pioneer
spacecraft
Earth has bid its final farewell to the Pioneer 10 spacecraft more
than 30 years after the probe set off for the outer regions of our
solar system.
The U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) announced
earlier today that it had received Pioneer's last signal in January, and
said it would no longer track the now remote object.
"After it passed Mars on its long journey into deep space, it was
venturing into places where nothing built by humanity had ever gone
before," said Colleen Hartman, director of NASA's solar system exploration
division. "It ranks among the most historic as well as the most
scientifically rich exploration missions ever undertaken."
Pioneer 10, one of a series of unmanned space probes, was launched in 1972
to study the outer planets of the solar system. It was the first to go
through the asteroid belt a doughnut-shaped ring between Earth and Mars
some 280 million km wide and 80 million km thick. It travels at speeds of
up to 72,000 kph and ranges in size from dust particles to rock chunks as
big as Alaska.
The craft was also the first to send back pictures of Saturn and Jupiter
from close-up, and the first to go beyond Pluto, the furthestmost planet
known.
NASA last received a signal back from Pioneer 10 on January 22 from a
distance of 12.2 billion km - 82 times the distance between the Earth and
the Sun. It took the very faint radio signal 11 hours and 20 minutes to
get home, traveling at the speed of light.
"Originally designed for a 21-month mission, Pioneer 10 exceeded all
expectations and lasted more than 30 years," said project manager Larry
Lasher of NASA's Ames Research Centre in California. "It was a workhorse
that far exceeded its warranty, and I guess you could say we got our
money's worth."
However, Pioneer is not the most remote human-made object. Voyager 1,
launched at a higher velocity in 1977, is 87 times the distance between
the Earth and Sun in another direction, said Pioneer 10 flight director
David Lozier. Voyager 1 is still sending back signals.
Although it seems that Pioneer 10 does not have any power to send any more
signals to Earth, it will keep traveling for many years to come unless it
runs into something. It's next destination is the red giant star
Aldebaran, located in the eye of the constellation Taurus the Bull. The
trip is expected to take two million years.
If alien life were to ever open Pioneer 10, they would find a gold plaque
with the image of a woman and a man and goodwill information about Earth.
"It theoretically could be picked up if there is some intelligence out
there," Lozier said.
Adam Tanner - Reuters
-- ******************************************************************** Amara Graps, PhD email: amara@amara.com Computational Physics vita: ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt Multiplex Answers URL: http://www.amara.com/ ******************************************************************** "Every exit is an entry somewhere else." --Tom Stoppard
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