Long before Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11, the famous unmanned spacecraft that completed the first trips to the outer solar system, the American Pioneer program began with a small disaster, dubbed Pioneer 0.
Designed to enter orbit around the moon, becoming the first spacecraft to leave Earth’s orbit, Pioneer 0 was launched on August 17, 1958 by the United States Air Force, the only launch overseen by that group before NASA took over. The flight lasted only 73.6 seconds before an explosion of the first stage of the booster brought the unmanned craft down into the Atlantic Ocean, casting serious doubt on the feasibility of sending probes beyond Earth’s orbit.
Had it been successful, the probe would have been officially named Pioneer 1.
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