The Last Words of Pioneer V

In a quiet White House visit last week, an English scientist delivered a memorable report: Radio-Astronomer A.C.B. (for Alfred Charles Bernard) Lovell, director of Britain's Jodrell Bank station, told President Eisenhower about the historic last days of the U.S.'s Pioneer V, man's most successful deep space probe. Pioneer's tiny five-watt radio transmitter had been designed to send messages until the probe was 5,000,000 miles away from the earth. Instead it kept sending and sending, getting its power from the solar cells on the probe's four "paddles." The 250-ft. radio telescope at Jodrell Bank kept listening. On June 26, Pioneer V sent a last six-minute message, bravely reporting the cosmic conditions around it. At that moment it was 22,462,740 miles from earth. Then the 94.8-lb. probe, on the 106th day of its journey, was swallowed forever by space.

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