Pioneer 10 and female along with several symbols that are designed to provide information about the origin of the spacecraft. The plaque is attached to the antenna support struts to provide some shielding from interstellar dust. In the film "", a Klingon ship destroys "Pioneer 10" as target practice. In the internet multimedia fiction project "17776", a sentient "Pioneer 10" is one of the main characters. Pioneer 10 Pioneer 10 (originally designated Pioneer F) is an American space probe, launched in 1972 and weighing , that completed the first mission to the planet Jupiter. Thereafter, "Pioneer 10" became the first of five
Exploration of Jupiter the direct trajectory. Ion thrusters capable of a delta-v of more than 10 kilometers/s were used on the Dawn spacecraft. This is more than enough delta-v to do a Jupiter fly-by mission from a solar orbit of the same radius as that of Earth without gravity assist. A major problem in sending space probes to Jupiter is that the planet has no solid surface on which to land, as there is a smooth transition between the planet's atmosphere and its fluid interior. Any probes descending into the atmosphere are eventually crushed by the immense pressures within Jupiter. Another major issue