Voyager's Grand Tour

by Henry C. Dethloff, Joli Ballew

"A rare planetary alignment, a visionary team, and two space probes have transformed our knowledge of the solar system - and beyond. Every 176 years, Earth and the outer planets gather on one side of the sun, allowing close observation in a single flight, or Grand Tour. To exploit this alignment, the Voyager team developed the so-called gravity assist that essentially sling-shot Voyager 1 and 2 from planet to planet." "Since their 1977 launch, the probes have discovered strange new worlds and transmitted streams of revolutionary data and eye-popping images that have exploded long-held theories and raised new questions about our solar system." With unfettered access to NASA archives and imagery, and interviews with Voyager scientists and engineers, Dethloff and Schorn have produced the only comprehensive account of one of man's foremost scientific and engineering achievements. Readers are invited into Voyager's inner circle, conceiving, launching, and directing the craft as it discovers rings around Jupiter, geysers on Triton, and intriguing possibilities of extraterrestrial life.

Genres: Science, Astronomy, History, Nonfiction, Space

272 pages, Hardcover

First published March 7, 2003

About the author

Henry Clay Dethloff was a professor emeritus of history at Texas A&M University in College Station who has written more than two dozen books on topics ranging from the space program to agriculture, American business, and Texas A&M itself.

Reviews

[Marie]

I really, truly, wanted to love this book. I've always been interested in space exploration, and I even did a project on the Voyager program back in junior high. It's too bad this book is drier than the Atacama Desert.

The first half of the book is devoted to the history of the Voyager program and it's antecedents. And when I say "history", I mean the cliche of a list of names and dates and pretty much nothing else. I mean, the author definitely did his research, but the book reads like he just typed up his notes. I spent the good part of a month reading this book. I usually don't spend that long reading a book unless it's 1000 pages long. It wasn't until I decided to skim the boring parts (and there are a lot of them) that I made any progress at all.

The science and discoveries of the Voyager program were pretty interesting, but again, these chapters were also bogged down by random paragraphs of dry facts. And considering that Voyager 1 & 2 were known for taking the first decent pictures of the outer planets and their systems, I expected there to be more, you know, pictures. Hell, the author made it a point to repeatedly say how important and visionary the imaging technology was, and yet there are very few good examples of it in the book.

Solidly between 2 and 3 stars, but will give it 2 because Voyager deserved better than an emotionless recitation of facts and figures.

[Tom Newman]

Artwork for cover was by Matt Battison. Received signed copy from Matt when he left Argon

[David]

Two space probes launched over thirty years ago are still active today. One of them is now the most distant man-made object in the universe. Prior to these probes, the outer planets of our solar system were nothing more than faint, blurry objects - all but their largest features as yet only conjecture. In 1998, one of the probes turned around and took the first-ever picture of the entire solar system - from "outside."

What an incredible tale this should make.

How colossally unfortunate it is that Voyager's Grand Tour is boring as hell.

First, some advice: do yourself a big favor and do not read the Forward. You'll be seeing this text again almost verbatim. Not that this will spare you from a general sense of déjà vu as you discover numerous repetitions of ideas and sentences. Book editors are for sissies, right?

I cannot stress enough how poorly this book was written.

Voyager's Grand Tour is split right in the middle into two halves: the first is about the genesis of the Voyager program at JPL/NASA, the second is about the discoveries made by the Voyager probes in the outer solar system.

The content and delivery of the first half of the book were frustratingly off the mark: where I had anticipated reading about the (surely fascinating) construction and engineering of the Voyager probes, I instead got a thorough treatment to the names of every bureaucrat who touched the project and a delightful dose of NASA budgeting and politicking. All of this is delivered like an uninterested child's school essay - as a collection of unrelated facts culled from an encyclopedia or Internet search. There is no attempt to create a narrative or find meaning.

Random fact: at one point I threw the book on the floor just because I was so tired to seeing the freaking words "Grand Tour" over and over and over.

Perhaps most astounding is that none of the Voyager technology or science is ever explained or expounded upon in any way. All science and technology information is given as lists of named components exactly as you find them on NASA’s website. Either the authors do not know anything about these topics or they simply chose not to impart the information. Either way, it's beyond lazy and also makes you wonder: what the hell is the purpose of this book?

The second half of the book is presented in the same fashion, but I had an easier time reading it. Dry facts and figures about the outer planets, their satellites, and the edges of our solar systems are way more interesting than dry facts about naming and budgeting for a space program. Still, this is no excuse. I could have learned far more on Wikipedia or nasa.gov had this been my goal.

In summary, this book is a frustrating lost opportunity which should cause the authors to cry themselves to sleep every night.

[Karen Grothe]

This is a detailed book covering the history of the Voyager missions, including the political, financial, and technological obstacles that had to be overcome. It is fascinating what the Voyager missions managed to accomplish! I took a long time finishing this book because it was quite detailed and easy to procrastinate reading it. As an engineer, I appreciated the engineering and project management details mostly in the first half of the book (although I can see how it might be too much detail for some people). As a fan of space exploration, I appreciated the details about the discoveries the Voyagers made at Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune.

2012 Update: My copy of this book has been personalized with the signatures of Dr. Ed Stone (on the page with his picture!), the one and only Project Scientist on the Voyager Program (started in 1972); Tom Krimigis, PI for Low-Energy Charged Particles; Norman Ness, PI for the Magnetometer; and Donald Gurnett, PI for the Plasma Wave Subsystem!

[Mike]

This book is a rough read, unless you are terribly interested in the history of the Voyager Program. This book covers from the programs roots in White Sands Missile Range where they were shooting off V2 rockets to the termination shock finally being reached by Voyager 2. I think where the book suffers most is the endless lists of people who worked on Voyager without giving much personality to them. The bio's say where they were educated how they came to be involved in voyager and not much else. No personal details, no quaint stories, these people are mere cardboard cut outs taking turns on the helm of Voyager. I personally enjoyed the book for the most part. Especially the portions about the science gleaned from this grand tour but I am apprehensive of recommending it to your average reader.

[Mark Fallon]

35 years ago the Voyager spacecraft headed out on their missions. Earlier this month, it was announced that Voyager 1 may have left the solar system, or at least the heliosphere. How could I not read this book?

Well, I wish I'd skimmed it more in the bookstore. The first half was basically a dull project management overview with a lot of detail and none of the spirit of the mission. The second half - the description of the actual encounters - was much better. It could have been improved with the inclusion of more actual images from the spacecraft.

Not a must read. However, I remain inspired by those who seek to learn the unknown.

[Michael Bond]

125 pages into a bureaucratic history of the Voyager program, and I surrender with 100 pages remaining. At some points I thought I had accidentally reread the same section, but it was actually a new section restating the same things, such as people I don't know being listed again. I hope that actually working for NASA is not as boring as this book. I will avoid further books in this series or by this publisher, as it is written in the dry style of an academic article about pottery sherds in Meso-America.

[Justin Moffitt]

Somehow this book managed to make such an exciting moment in human history, unresponsive, dull, a story with no personality. It's packed with an introduction every other sentence of some guy who somewhat contributed to the project, as if the author didn't want to insult a single soul. Doesn't matter if the man flicked a piece of dirt of a rocket or designed the whole thing himself, they'll both get the same amount of credit.

This is a terrible book, worthy of no praise. There has to be a lot better books out there about this same subject.

[Cheri]

Enjoyed reading the historical context and development of the Voyager Mission. Some of the details were a little dry, but overall really enjoyed reading something other than psychology texts (although there definitely were some egos involved!)

[Kirsten]

Misplaced during move.