PI's Perspective: What if Voyager had explored Pluto? Options

[Planet X]

Check out this latest PI's perspective. It is a very interesting read. I will be pointing out a similar and even more interesting concept later on. Stay tuned!

J P

[machi]

Thanks for this interesting image. I always wondered if there was some relatively close flyby in case of Pioneers and Voyagers.

[SFJCody]

Had we known about all the big TNOs we know of now back in 1980, I wonder if it would have been possible to design a Saturn flyby trajectory for Voyager 1 that would have taken it to a close flyby with a different dwarf planet without sacrificing the close pass of Titan. Perhaps the same thing could have been achieved with Voyager 2 and Neptune/Triton.

[Alan Stern]

Had we known about all the big TNOs we know of now back in 1980, I wonder if it would have been possible to design a Saturn flyby trajectory for Voyager 1 that would have taken it to a close flyby with a different dwarf planet without sacrificing the close pass of Titan. Perhaps the same thing could have been achieved with Voyager 2 and Neptune/Triton.

Interesting question. We looked at the same for our New Horizons 2 proposal to flyby Uranus then a big KBO. That was entirely feasible.

Same would have been true for the encounters you refer to, but as with NH2, the targeting to a big Charon-class) KBO would require optimizing both arrival date and B-plane coordinates. Getting to a 100-300 km class KBO would be much easier and still fascinating for a future giant planet mission, particularly if we get Pluto and a small KBO in the bag with NH. But as to Vgr, they never knew to even try...really too bad....though had they known, it might have squelched ever getting NH.

We'll never know.