Experimental Blog #124

Notes and such from "Lives of the Planets - A Natural History of the Solar System" by Richard Corfield

"Stonehenge is a Stone Age supercomputer" which "was built over a fifteen hundred year period from about 3100 BC to 1500 BC". It "helped Neolithic peoples keep pace with the turning of the seasons ... and predicting the occurance of crucial astronomical events such as eclipses."

"Mariner 2 was launched on August 27, 1962, and ...  became the first spacecraft to successfully fly by another planet; it sped past Venus on December 14, 1962."
On October 22, 1975 the Soviet "Venera 9 had become the first spacecraft to place a satellite in permanent orbit around another planet."
"In 1969, Venera 5 and 6 were also successful atmospheric probes, and in 1970, Venera 7 became the first Earth-built spacecraft to land on the surface of another planet."
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency has landed a small spacecraft named Hayabusa on the surface of the astroid Itokawa. The launch was on May 9, 2003 and Hayabusa arrived at Itokawa in September of 2005.{After this book was written samples were returned to Earth in 2010.}

The American Pioneer 10 was launched on March 2, 1972; and within 18 minutes achieved a "staggering" 32,000 mph. By December 3, 1973 "Jupiter's massive gravity had accelerated Pioneer 10 to 82,000 mph.
Voyagers 1 and 2 were launched in September and August of 1977 and arrived near Jupiter in March and July of 1979. Voyager 2 arrived in Uranian space on January 24, 1986 and then reached Neptune on August 25, 1989. On the same day "Voyager 2 had passed the last of Neptune's moons and was dropping out of the bottom of the solar system to begin its eternal fall into the vastnesses of space between the stars. In slightly less than 300,000 years, it will make its first approach to another star - the hot, bright furnace of Sirius."