Science: Exploring the Planets

Astronauts will not return to space until the joint U.S.-Russian venture in 1975. But last week unmanned robot craft were ranging far and wide across the solar system on missions of planetary exploration. NASA announced that Pioneer 11, already three-quarters of the way to Jupiter, will proceed to Saturn and provide the first close-up look at the ringed planet. From Mars, an orbiting Soviet spacecraft sent back new, detailed views of the Martian surface. At week's end, fresh from its reconnaissance of cloud-shrouded Venus, Mariner 10, now nearing Mercury, began transmitting its first...

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