20 August 1977: Voyager 2 was launched from Launch Complex 41 at the Kennedy Space Center, Cape Canaveral, Florida, aboard a Titan IIIE-Centaur launch vehicle. It was placed on an orbital trajectory that would take it on a journey throughout the Solar System and beyond.

Nearly two years later, 9 July 1979, Voyager 2 made its closest approach to Jupiter, passing within 350,000 miles (570,000 kilometers) of the planet. Many dramatic images as well as scientific data were transmitted back to Earth.

The probe continued outward to Saturn, Neptune and Uranus, continuously transmitting images and data. In 1990, the space probe passed beyond the limits of the Solar System.

Voyager 2 is now approaching interstellar space. It is still transiting the heliosheath, where “solar wind” is slowed by the pressure of interstellar gas. (10,706,654,718 miles, or 17,230,690,530 kilometers, from the Sun, as of 17:22:00 hours, PDT, 19 August 2017) and is still operating, 40 years after it was launched.

© 2017, Bryan R. Swopes