Following on the pathfinding heels of Pioneer 11, Voyager 1 flew 124,000 kilometers (77,000 miles) above Saturn's cloudtops in 1980, targeted for a close look at Saturn's large moon Titan.

Titan proved to be so heavily shrouded by a thick, nitrogen-rich atmosphere that Voyager's cameras could not image the moon's surface, but other instruments gathered Titan data. Voyager 1 returned stunning images of Saturn and its rings, showing that the rings are far more complex than ever imagined. Unusual ring features called "spokes" may be particles electrostatically levitated above the ring plane. Some rings defied explanation, being elliptical, discontinuous, or multi-stranded. Several small satellites were found guiding ring material between them, providing clues to age-old questions about the formation and lifetime of planetary rings.

With the completion of its Saturn observations, Voyager 1's prime mission was complete, and the spacecraft became a solar physics laboratory, monitoring fields and particles in the interplanetary medium. In February 1991, from a vantage point 3.7 billion miles from the Sun and 32 degrees above the plane of the ecliptic, Voyager 1 returned an historic "family portrait" of nearly all the planets in our solar system. Voyager 1 is continuing its journey toward interstellar space, and is now farther from Earth than any other spacecraft.

Key Dates

Status: Headed to Interstellar Space

Link: Voyager News

Source: NASA