JPL marks 90 years since its founding in 1936, celebrating past achievements and detailing upcoming missions including SkyFall, MoonFall, and NEO Surveyor.
01Summary
- 01JPL was founded on Oct. 31, 1936, when Caltech graduate students conducted rocket tests in Pasadena's Arroyo Seco.
- 02JPL launched America's first satellite, Explorer 1, in 1958, which discovered Earth's radiation belts.
- 03Planned missions include SkyFall (three helicopters to map Mars ice, launch 2028) and MoonFall (propulsive drones to lunar south pole, same year).
- 04NEO Surveyor, managed by JPL, will hunt for potentially hazardous asteroids not detectable by other telescopes.
- 05Voyager 1 is set to reach a full light-day (16 billion miles) from Earth on Nov. 18, 2024.
02Why it matters
JPL's upcoming missions aim to map Martian ice, study solar activity, and detect hazardous asteroids, directly supporting human exploration and planetary defence.
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