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VoyagerhasVisionToo!
MarkRickabaugh,PatrickMiga,
KaelaFrazier,andMattBarulic
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FollowthejourneyofaprobenamedVoyager2
throughthesolarsystem!Onyourjourney,youcan
findthedefinitionsofunderlinedwordsinthe
Glossaryattheendofthebook.Putonyourspacesuit
andgetreadyforthejourneyofalifetime!
This is Voyager 2, a
probe built to explore
the solar system! He
was built right here, at
NASA’s Jet Propulsion
Laboratory (JPL) in
Pasadena, California.
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His mission was to flyby all of
the big planets in the outer
solar system to learn about
each one. He has a sister
named Voyager 1, who was
launched 2 weeks after he
was. She was more interested
in Saturn’s moon Titan, and did
not follow Voyager 2 for his
whole journey.
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1: Sept 5, 1977
2: Aug 20, 1977
He brought all kinds of cameras and
tools to learn about the planets on
his trip. He could measure the
magnetic field of the planets as well
as what the planet is made of .
Whatever he found he reported
back to Earth using his giant
antenna.
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Voyager 2 left Earth on August
20th, 1977 on a Titan 3E Rocket
from Cape Canaveral, Florida.
WhoaaaaI’m
goingfast!
By the time he left the the orbit
of Earth, he was going nearly
36,000 miles per hour, which is
fast enough to fly around the
Earth almost one and a half
times in just one hour!
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Even though he left
Earth extremely quickly,
Voyager needed help
reaching the Outer Solar
System.
It’swaycooler
thanaroller
coaster!
To do this, he used the
planets themselves! By using
a gravity assist, Voyager 2 got
a boost of speed by passing
each planet, using their size
and pull to slingshot himself
in and out of their orbit and
on to the next planet.
After traveling through the
solar system for two years,
Voyager 2 had finally reached
Jupiter’s orbit. The little probe
was shocked by the size of the
planet. It looked like 1300
Earths could fit inside of the
gas giant!
Lookatthe
GreatRed
Spot!
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To his surprise, he saw the
Great Red Spot - a violent
storm almost like a huge,
never-ending hurricane. The
thought of being stuck in such a
terrifying storm encouraged
Voyager to explore Jupiter’s
moons.
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Wow,Jupiterhas
over60moons!
Unlike Earth, Jupiter has
many moons. Voyager felt as
if he were in the center of a
mini-solar system! In fact,
Jupiter and its moons are
known as the Jovian system.
NASA tasked Voyager with
flying by five specific moons:
Callisto, Ganymede, Europa,
Amalthea, and Io.
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Thereareso
manycraters!
Thefirstmoontheprobe
encounteredwasCallisto,
whichhasmanymore
cratersonitssurfacethan
Earth’smoon.Thecraterson
Callisto’ssurfaceindicated
thatitistheoldestsurface
intheentiresolarsystem!
Next, Voyager flew by Ganymede – the
largest of Jupiter’s moons. Voyager saw
patterns of different colored grooves
on the surface of Ganymede, almost
like the different color bands on a
Zebra.
Ganymedeisthe
sizeofaplanet!
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Voyagermadehis
waytoEuropanext.
UnlikeCallistoand
Ganymede,
Voyagerobserved
howsmooththe
surfaceofEuropa
was.Hecouldalso
seeathicklayerof
iceonthemoon’s
surface.
Europahasmore
icethan
Antarctica!
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Amalthealooks
likeagiantrock!
The next stop on
Voyager’s
journey
was Amalthea – a red
moon that might
have once been an
asteroid. An asteroid
is like a giant rock
traveling
through
space.
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Volcanoes?Feels
justlikehome!
The last moon to visit on
Voyager’s journey was Io - a
very orange moon. With his
own two eyes, Voyager
discovered that Io is home
to nine active volcanoes.
These volcanoes are just like
the ones back on Earth.
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After four years in space,
Voyager 2 reached the ringed
planet Saturn. His cameras were
able to see new details about
Saturn’s atmosphere. He found
streaks of colors and winds over
1100 miles per hour.
Being made mostly of Helium
and Hydrogen, the two lightest
elements, Saturn is the only
planet with a lower density
than water.
Saturnwould
floatinabig
enoughocean!
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It’saplanet-sized
hula-hoop!
Voyager 2 also took time
to study Saturn’s rings in
more detail. These rings
are made of chunks of ice
of various sizes. Some of
the chunks of ice are as
small as a fine dust, while
others are as big as a
house!
Voyager2reached
Uranusaftereight
yearsofspace
travel.
Uranusspins
sidewayscompared
totheother
planets,which
causesextreme
seasonsonthe
planet.Every
seasononUranus
lastsover20years!
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Longestsummer
vacationever!
Uranushas27
moons!
While Voyager 2 was
visiting Uranus, he
managed to discover
10 new moons orbiting
around the planet!
Uranus’s moons are
named after characters
in Shakespeare's plays,
including Puck, the
largest moon Voyager
2 discovered.
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After traveling
through space for
12 long years,
Voyager finally
arrived at Neptune.
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Itlooks
likeagiant
ocean!
Itmakes
planes
lookslow!
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Voyager saw the great
dark spot, which is a
gigantic storm with winds
as fast as 1500 miles per
hour. That’s about 3 times
faster than a passenger
airplane!
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It’srevolving
thewrong
way!
Voyager then arrived at
Triton, Neptune’s largest
moon. Triton is the only
moon with a retrograde orbit,
meaning that it orbits in the
opposite direction to
Neptune’s spin.
After leaving Neptune
and traveling for some
time, Voyager 2 was
farther away from the
Sun than any of the
planets in the solar
system.
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Iamsofar
awayfrom
home.
Voyager is so far away
from Earth at this point in
the journey that it appears
as a tiny speck
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Icanmakeso
manynew
friends!
Leaving the solar system
and all the planets behind
makes Voyager seem
alone. However, the size
of the solar system is
nothing compared to the
size of the Milky Way
galaxy. There are billions
of stars in the galaxy and
each one may have its
own solar system.
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Iamsoexcited
toexplorethe
newfrontier!
Beyond the Milky Way galaxy lies
the rest of the universe. There
may be as many galaxies in the
universe as there are stars in the
galaxy!
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Glossary
• SolarSystem:thecollectionofplanetsandtheirmoonsinorbit
aroundthesun.
• NASAJPL:NASA’sresearchlabsinCaliforniawhereitbuildsandtests
vehiclesgoingtospace
• MagneticField:A“forcefield”causedbyaplanetorstar’scorethat
surroundsthebody
• GravityAssist:Flyingcloseenoughtotheplanettouseitsgravityto
accelerateasitleavestheplanet.
• Asteroid:Arockybodythatorbitsthesun.
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Glossary
• Density:Theamountofmatterinanobjectperunitofvolume.
• Orbit:Thepathofanobjectaroundastar,moon,orplanet.
• RetrogradeOrbit:Anorbitthatisintheoppositedirectionofthe
planet’srotation.
• MilkyWayGalaxy:Thegalaxythatoursolarsystemisin.
• Universe:allofspaceandeverythinginitincludingplanets,stars,and
galaxies,etc.
• Crater:alarge,bowl-shapedholeonthesurfaceofaplanetormoon
• GasGiant:Aplanetthatdoesnothaveasolidsurface.
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ImageCredits
• SolarSystem,Anonymous,BlendSpace.
• Voyager2,NASAJetPropulsionLaboratory,NASA.
• SmileyEyes,MohamedIbrahim,Clkr.
• Stars,Anonymous,WordPress.
• Jupiter,MatthewRiley,TheMonitorDaily.
• Jupitervs.Earth,Thinglink.
• JovianSystem,Anonymous,Wikipedia.
• Callisto,JohnvanVilet,TheCelestia Motherlode.
• Europa,Anonymous,Setterfield.
• ViewofSaturn’sRings,JPL,NASA.
• UranusbyVoyager2,NASA.Uranusanditsmoons,
JPL,NASA.
• Neptune,Anonymous,TheTelegraph.
• Neptune,NASA,NationalGeographic.
• MontageofNeptuneandTriton,JPL,NASA.
• PaleBlueDot,JPL,NASA.
• TheMilkyWayPanorama,Brunier,ESO.
• HubbleeXtreme DeepField,Hubble,JPLI.
• Ganymede,Nivin Js,SmartnTechs.
• Io,AnneMinard,UniverseToday.
• Amalthea,SpaceTrip,TheCelestia Motherlode.
• JPL,JPL,NASA.
• DiagramofVoyager,JPL,NASA.
• Saturn,JPL,NASA.