a farewell to NASA’s brave little Pioneer

NASA reported last week that it has finally lost contact with its Pioneer 10 spacecraft. Launched in 1972, the craft had been in service for more than 30 years. Pioneer was the first probe to pass through the asteroid belt, make direct observations of Jupiter, and pass Pluto’s orbit. As Earth’s first emissary into deep space, it carried a gold plaque describing what humans look like, a map showing Earth’s location, and the date its mission began. On Jan. 22, Pioneer sent its last, weak signal to Earth. Since then, further attempts to contact the craft have been unsuccessful. It is believed that Pioneer’s radioisotope power source has decayed, and that it doesn’t have enough power to send additional transmissions. At last contact, Pioneer was 7.6 billion miles from Earth, coasting in the general direction of Aldebaran, a star some 68 light years away. It will take the craft some two million years to reach it.

This news brief appeared in the Random Data column of the Boston Globe’s Health/Science section on 3/04/2003.