Pioneer Saturn Encounter

Part 1

PIONEER SATURN ENCOUNTER

CONTENTS

Foreword 1 Introduction 3 Pioneer Saturn 4 Saturn Images 8 Science Highlights 21 Outward Bound 28

FOREWORD

The Pioneer 10 and 11 spacecraft, launched in 1972 and 1973, respectively, were well named: they made the first crossings of the asteroid belt and were the first to encounter Jupiter and its intense radiation belts. Pioneer 11’s trajectory, bent into a hairpin curve by Jupiter’s powerful gravitational field, allowed it to recross the solar system to make the first flyby of Saturn almost a billion miles from Earth where it came within 13,300 miles of the cloud tops.

Assembled in this publication is a selection of the pictures returned by Pioneer 11 of Saturn and its largest moon, Titan. These images are of great beauty as well as of great scientific interest, serving to whet our appetite for the more detailed observations to be made by Voyager in 1980 and 1981. Tracking of both Pioneers will continue for many more years, providing fundamental data on the nature of interplanetary space in the depths of the solar system. The results of these outer-planet Pioneer missions have far exceeded our hopes and expectations of a decade ago when the program was initiated.

Robert A. Frosch, Administrator National Aeronautics and Space Administration

September 1979

NASA National Aeronautics and Space Administration Ames Research Center Moffett Field. California 94035

INTRODUCTION

We have entered into a new era of space exploration. Missions undertaken during the lunar exploration of the 1960’s typically lasted a matter of days with commands issued and carried out in near real time. Now, a decade later, planetary voyages may last for many years as the spiraling trajectories of the spacecraft make periodic intersections with the orbits of the planets. Communicating with us across the vastness of space, these spacecraft report to us their experiences as they traverse the outer reaches of the solar system.

Among these deep space travelers, Pioneers 10 and 11 are appropriately named, for they truly are pioneering the exploration of the outer solar system. Launched in 1972 and in 1973, respectively, they were the first spacecraft to fly by Jupiter (in 1973 and 1974). At Jupiter, Pioneer 11’s trajectory was carefully targeted to swing it toward Saturn for an encounter in September 1979. We see some of the early results in this publication.

Other spacecraft are following along the trail blazed by Pioneer Saturn. Voyager 1 passed by Jupiter in March 1979 and will reach Saturn in November 1980. Voyager 2 has also passed beyond Jupiter and will encounter Saturn in August 1981, with the further possibility of traveling on to Uranus (a 1986 encounter). Under development are the Galileo orbiter and atmospheric entry probe, destined to journey to Jupiter where the orbiter will return more detailed information, including high-resolution pictures of the Galilean satellites, and the probe will penetrate deep below the Jovian clouds.

In the coming years, each of these follow-on missions will enrich our understanding of the solar system, greatly supplementing the observations of Pioneers 10 and 11. But one thing will never change. The Pioneers were first.

Thomas A. Mutch Associate Administrator for Space Science National Aeronautics and Space Administration

PIONEER SATURN

Pioneer Saturn has given us our first close view of the spectacular ringed planet Saturn and its system of moons. The spacecraft began its journey to the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn on April 5, 1973, as Pioneer 11. It reached Jupiter on December 2, 1974, passing within 42,760 km of the Jovian cloud tops and taking the only existing pictures of Jupiter’s polar regions. Jupiter’s massive gravitational field was used to swing Pioneer 11 back across the solar system toward Saturn. Additional maneuvers were executed in 1975 and 1976 to place the spacecraft on a suitable trajectory, with the final aimpoint selected in 1977.

From the many possible targeting options for the first Saturn flyby, two aimpoints were considered, both of which would result in a near-equatorial flyby that would give the best mapping of the high-energy particles and the magnetic field near the planet. The difference between these two aimpoints, which came to be known as the “inside” and “outside” options, was their relationship to Saturn’s unique ring system first discovered by Galileo in 1610. The “outside” option was finally selected because it was considered to be of less risk to the spacecraft and more valuable in planning the subsequent encounter of Saturn by Voyager 2, which will reach Saturn in 1981. Final targeting was completed during early 1978, when a series of timed rocket thrusts locked Pioneer into the desired trajectory.

On September 1, 1979, the spacecraft, now designated Pioneer Saturn, reached Saturn after 6 years in flight. It passed through the ring plane outside the edge of Saturn’s A-ring and then swung in under the rings from 2,000 to 10,000 km below them. At the point of closest approach, it attained a speed of 114,100 km/h (71,900 mi/h) and came within 21,400 km of the planet’s cloud tops. While it was approaching, encountering, and leaving Saturn, the spacecraft took the first closeup pictures of the planet, showing 20 to 30 times more detail than the best pictures taken from Earth, and made the first close measurements of its rings and several of its moons, including the largest moon, the planet-sized Titan. Titan, along with Mars, has been considered by many scientists to be the most likely place to find life in the solar system.

Pioneer Saturn unraveled many mysteries. It determined that Saturn has a magnetic field and trapped radiation belts, measured the mass of Saturn and some of its moons, and studied the character of Saturn’s interior. It confirmed the presence and determined the magnitude of an internal heat source for Saturn. Its instruments studied the temperature distribution, composition, and other properties of the clouds and atmospheres of Saturn and Titan, and took photometric and polarization measurements of Iapetus, Rhea, Dione, and Tethys. Pioneer may also have discovered a previously unknown moon of Saturn. The spacecraft measured the mass, structure, and other characteristics of Saturn’s rings, and passed safely through the outer E-ring, which posed a potential hazard for Pioneer. It also discovered new rings. One of these rings, called the F-ring by the Pioneer team, lies just outside the A-ring. The gap between the F-ring and the A-ring has been tentatively designated the Pioneer Division. The other new ring has been called the G-ring, which lies well outside the F-ring.

Pioneer carries a scientific payload of 11 operating instruments; another instrument, the asteroid/meteoroid detector, was turned off in 1975. Two other experiments, celestial mechanics and S-band occultation of Saturn, use the spacecraft radio to obtain data. Pioneer Saturn is a spinning spacecraft, which gives its instruments a full-circle scan 7.8 times a minute. It uses a nuclear source for electric power because the sunlight at Jupiter and beyond is too weak for a solar-powered system.

Two booms project from the spacecraft to deploy the nuclear power source about 3 meters from the sensitive spacecraft instrumentation. A third boom positions the magnetometer sensor about 6 meters from the spacecraft. Six thrusters provide velocity, attitude, and spin-rate control. A dish antenna is located along the spin axis and looks back at Earth throughout the mission, adjusting its view by changes in spacecraft attitude as the spacecraft and Earth move in their orbits around the sun.

Tracking facilities of NASA’s Deep Space Network, located at Goldstone, California, and in Spain and Australia, supported Pioneer Saturn during interplanetary flight and encounter. Pioneer’s radio signals, traveling at the speed of light, took 85 minutes to reach Earth from Saturn, a round-trip time of almost 3 hours, somewhat complicating ground control of the spacecraft. Almost 10,000 commands were sent to the spacecraft in the 2-week period before closest approach. Continued communications should be possible through at least the mid 1980’s.

After the spacecraft passed Saturn, it headed out of the solar system, traveling in the direction the solar system moves with respect to the local stars in our galaxy and in approximately an opposite direction from its sister spacecraft, Pioneer 10. Both spacecraft have plaques attached to them which contain a message from Earth for any intelligent species that may intercept the spacecraft during their endless journeys through interstellar space.

Pioneer Saturn Scientific Instruments Instrument Principal Investigator Experiment Objective

Helium vector Edward J. Smith Magnetic fields magnetometer Jet Propulsion Laboratory Fluxgate Mario Acuña Magnetic fields magnetometer Goddard Space Flight Center Plasma analyzer John H. Wolfe Solar plasma Ames Research Center Charged particle John A. Simpson Charged particle University of Chicago composition Cosmic ray telescope Frank B. McDonald Cosmic ray energy Goddard Space Flight Center spectra Geiger tube James A. Van Allen Charged particles telescope University of Iowa Trapped radiation R. Walker Fillius Trapped radiation detector University of California, San Diego Asteroid/meteoroid Robert K. Soberman Asteroid/meteoroid detector General Electric Co. and astronomy Philadelphia Drexel University Meteoroid detector William H. Kinard Meteoroid detection Langley Research Center Radio transmitter John D. Anderson Celestial mechanics and DSN Jet Propulsion Laboratory Ultraviolet Darrell L. Judge Ultraviolet photometer University of Southern photometry California Los Angeles Imaging Tom Gehrels Photo imaging and photopolarimeter University of Arizona, Tucson polarimetry Infrared radiometer Andrew Ingersoll Infrared thermal California Institute of structure Technology Radio transmitter Arvydas J. Kliore S-band occultation and DSN Jet Propulsion Laboratory

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