Category:Space probes

Explanation

• Most mentioned are the Voyager probes as well as Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11.
  • One comic is even named after Voyager 1: 1189: Voyager 1. It tallies the number of times the space probe has left the solar system (22!)
  • In 482: Height Voyager 1 and Pioneer 10 are shown. (They are labeled but there is also a third space probe near Voyager 1 that is not labeled. Being close to Voyager 1 it could be assumed to be Voyager 2, but the “height” may rather indicate that is should be Pioneer 11).
  • In 502: Dark Flow the Pioneer Anomaly, observed for the Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11 space probes, is mentioned in the title text.
  • 1246: Pale Blue Dot references the Pale Blue Dot a picture of the Earth taken in 1990 by Voyager 1.
  • In 1276: Angular Size both voyager probes projections are shown in the last panel.
  • In 1461: Payloads several space probes are shown in the chart including both Voyager 2 and Pioneer 10.
  • One of the what if? entries is called Voyager about retrieving it again...
  • Voyager 1 is mentioned twice in Thing Explainer both in Worlds around the Sun (where 25 other probes were also mentioned including Voyager 2 as well) and in The sky at night. It is called Big Trip Taker One in the book.
• Most prominent features of space probes are in these comics which all directly related to an upcoming or even ongoing event (with extra references to the same space probes included as well):
  • The latter was the case in 1446: Landing which was a stop motion live tracking of the progress of the Philae lander separating from the European Space Agency's Rosetta probe to land on comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. (This was also one of the space probes shown in Payloads).
    • 1621: Fixion depicts Rosetta and the Fixion explains the flyby anomaly experienced the first time (of three) the probe got close to Earth
  • In 1476: Ceres the photos taken by the Dawn space probe of Ceres, the largest known asteroid and the smallest known dwarf planet, is used in this comic, a few months before the probe went into orbit around Ceres. (This was also one of the space probes shown in Payloads).
    • This probe is also featured in Thing Explainer in Worlds around the Sun where it is called Special Engine Boat.
  • 1532: New Horizons is named after New Horizons, the NASA space probe sent to study the dwarf planet Pluto and its moons. In this comic, from 1½ month before the probe reached Pluto, it turns out an error has sent the probe back to Earth instead. (The Dawn mission is mentioned here as well).
    • 1551: Pluto was released on the day of New Horizons closest approach to Pluto on 2015-07-14 as a tribute to the achievement.
    • On the same day the what if? New Horizons was released.
  • 1547: Solar System Questions asks several questions about among other the Philae lander, about Pluto and Charon (moon), stating we have the answer soon, a clear reference to New Horizons, about Ceres saying we are working on it, a clear reference to Dawn and about both the Pioneer Anomaly and the flyby anomaly, thus referencing at least five of the comics mentioned above.
• The last Pioneer reference in Solar System Questions take these space probes up to four comics, but they still fall one short of the Voyager space probes with five comics.
• These are the remaining comics related to space probes:
  • In 1244: Six Words Cueball shows a possible trajectory path for a space probe.
  • In 1337: Hack the ISEE-3/ICE space probe is taken over by elite hackers.
  • In 1536: The Martian the title text is a reference to a particular part of The Martians story involving the Pathfinder space probe that NASA landed on Mars in 1997.
    • The Mars rover Sojourner from the Pathfinder expedition was later referenced in 1585: Similarities (also only in the title text ) on the day the movie was released,
  • In 1643: Degrees regarding the use of non-SI units in the US, the Mars Climate Orbiter space probe is referenced through mentioning that We lost a Mars probe over this crap which relates to the fact that the cause of failure for this probe was the use of different units by two different teams working on the same part of the probe.
• Space probes also features prominently in the what if? Blog.
  • As mentioned above one of the entries is called Voyager and another New Horizons. There may be more...
• Space probes also features prominently in the book Thing Explainer:
  • Several space probes (six) going through our solar system as well as more than 20 of those that came close to Mars are displayed in the description of the Solar system in Worlds around the Sun.
  • And in The sky at night Voyager 1 is also shown.