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1612 Galileo Galilei
was the first astronomer
to observe the planet Neptune when it was in conjunction with Jupiter, yet he mistakenly catalogued it as a fixed star because of its extremely slow motion along the ecliptic. Neptune was not truly discovered until 1846, about 234 years after Galileo first sighted it with his telescope
.
1690 Earliest recorded sighting of the planet Uranus, by John Flamsteed
, who mistakenly catalogues it as the star 34 Tauri.
1737 May 28 — The planet Venus passed in front of Mercury
. The event is witnessed during the evening hours by the amateur astronomer
John Bevis at the Royal Greenwich Observatory. As of 2005, it is still the only such planet/planet occultation that has been directly observed.
1749 According to mathematical calculations, Pluto moved outside Neptune's orbit to remain the outermost planet until 1979.
1781 Sir William Herschel
discovers the planet Uranus. Originally he calls it ''Georgium Sidus'' (George's Star) in honour of King George III
of England
.
1915 Pluto is photographed for the first time but was not recognized as a planet.
1964 Mariner program
: NASA launches the Mariner 4 space probe from Cape Kennedy toward Mars to take television pictures of that planet in July 1965.
1965 Venera program: The Soviet Union
launches the Venera 3 space probe from Baikonur, Kazakhstan
toward Venus (on March 1, 1966 it became the first spacecraft to reach the surface of another planet).
1966 Soviet space probe
''Venera 3'' crashes on Venus, becoming the first spacecraft
to land on another planet's surfa
1967 Venera program: Venera 4 is launched (it will become the first space probe
to enter another planet's atmosphere and successfully return data).
1970 Venera program: Venera 7 is launched. It will later becomes the first spacecraft to successfully transmit data from another planet.
1979 The U.S. Pioneer 11 becomes the first spacecraft to visit Saturn, when it passes the planet at a distance of 21,000 km.
1980 Voyager program
: The NASA
space probe ''Voyager I'' makes its closest approach to Saturn, when it flies within 77,000 miles of the planet's cloud-tops and sends the first high resolution images of the world back to scientists on Earth
.
1982 Syzygy: all nine planets align on the same side of the Sun
.
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Timeline
