On this day! Oct. 8, 1992: Pioneer 12 Burns Up in Venus' Atmosphere

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On Oct. 8, 1992, NASA's Pioneer 12 spacecraft burned up in the atmosphere of Venus.

On Oct. 8, 1992, NASA's Pioneer 12 spacecraft burned up in the atmosphere of Venus.

Pioneer 12, also known as the Pioneer Venus Orbiter, spent 14 years orbiting Venus and studying the planet's atmosphere. It also investigated how the planet's ionosphere and magnetic field interact with charged particles from the sun called solar wind.

An artist's illustration of NASA's Pioneer 12 spacecraft, also known as Pioneer Venus Orbiter, which explored the cloudy planet for 14 years from orbit. (Image credit: NASA)

Pioneer 12 even got to check out Halley's Comet while it was in orbit around Venus.

When Pioneer 12 ran out of propellant, its orbit naturally started to decay, and it disintegrated in Venus's atmosphere.

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Hanneke Weitering
Hanneke Weitering
Contributing expert

Hanneke Weitering is a multimedia journalist in the Pacific Northwest reporting on the future of aviation at FutureFlight.aero and Aviation International News and was previously the Editor for Spaceflight and Astronomy news here at Space.com. As an editor with over 10 years of experience in science journalism she has previously written for Scholastic Classroom Magazines, MedPage Today and The Joint Institute for Computational Sciences at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. After studying physics at the University of Tennessee in her hometown of Knoxville, she earned her graduate degree in Science, Health and Environmental Reporting (SHERP) from New York University. Hanneke joined the Space.com team in 2016 as a staff writer and producer, covering topics including spaceflight and astronomy. She currently lives in Seattle, home of the Space Needle, with her cat and two snakes. In her spare time, Hanneke enjoys exploring the Rocky Mountains, basking in nature and looking for dark skies to gaze at the cosmos. 

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