Mariner 2: first successful planetary flyby (Venus)
Mariner 2: primer sobrevuelo planetario con éxito (Venus)
- Date
- 14 de diciembre de 1962 · confidence high
- Place
- Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, United States
- Credited to
- JPL / NASA
- Field
- Movement
What was discovered
The first probe to observe another planet at close range. It passed about 35,000 km from Venus and measured a very hot surface (about 400 °C), no magnetic field and a continuous solar wind.
The Soviets launched Venera 1 in 1961 but lost contact before the flyby.
What it led to
- end of the image of Venus as a temperate, habitable world
- the Mariner programme of interplanetary exploration
- continuous measurement of the solar wind