Some time in mid-December, if all goes well, the spacecraft Mariner II will skim within a scant 10,000 miles of Venus. Like a great mechanical bug, it will point its electronic eyes at the cloud-covered planet; and then, after a brief, 30-minute look, it will soar past to lose itself in orbit around the sun. But before it cruises beyond radio range of earth. Mariner should report back to its human creators and tell them more than man has ever known before about his planetary neighbor, the heavenly body that most resembles earth in...
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