This Week in Space History- November 11th-17th
Apologies for this article releasing a bit late. I’ve been putting the finishing touches on the Apollo 12 50th anniversary posts I’m writing for the Cosmosphere. Be sure to follow the Cosmosphere’s Facebook page so you can see the 12 days of Apollo 12 posts I’ve been writing. As always, thanks to Michele at the Cosmosphere for the artwork and for coordinating these posts. I really appreciate it!
Now, here’s some space history.
Titan Flyby-
On November 12th, 1980 Voyager 1 performed a flyby of Titan, giving us glimpses of that unique moon. The Titan flyby didn’t provide any information about the surface of this moon since this strange world has an incredibly thick atmosphere that prevents visual observation of surface features. Voyager did measure the surface pressure of Titan, finding its 1.6 times as high as the pressure here on Earth.
Voyager was never designed to orbit the moon, so it’s brief flyby from about 4,000 miles away was the only time the spacecraft would image the moon. Titan was studied in greater detail by the Cassini spacecraft for about 13 years, with the mission ending in September of 2017.
