Pioneer 10 launches. It quickly becomes the fastest object ever built by man, traveling at 50,000 km/h, and in just 11 hours it passes the Moon. (It hasn’t been for some time—the Parker probe is now, and by far…) After a few months, it crosses the asteroid belt, with scientists holding their breath. It will be the first probe to do so, thus verifying that the amount of dangerous objects and dust is well below fears. It is the first man-made object to leave the Solar System. Its plutonium core will shut down in 2003. In about 2 million years, it will arrive near Aldebaran.
