this post was submitted on 12 Oct 2026
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xkcd #3310: Rejected Space Mission Profiles

Title text:

Although NASA agreed that Voyager 2 'seemed lonely' they decided against launching a companion orbiter mission after further measurements indicated that the spacecraft actually preferred the peace and quiet.

Transcript:

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Source: https://xkcd.com/3310/

explainxkcd for #3310

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[–] hemko@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 12 minutes ago
[–] Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world 9 points 1 hour ago (2 children)

The funniest thing about a crewed mission to Pluto, in my opinion, is that it would take something like a decade to get there. Having a living human past Pluto's orbit would be a huge achievement. Getting them back alive? More than doubly so.

[–] ryrybang@lemmy.world 3 points 32 minutes ago

I have a few suggestions for candidate ~~prisoners~~ astronauts for this mission.

[–] digdig@piefed.social 1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)
[–] cannedtuna@lemmy.world 5 points 1 hour ago (1 children)
[–] digdig@piefed.social 1 points 1 hour ago (1 children)

I don't care, Pluto deserves to be a Planet. Classification be dammed.

Maybe if we find some water on it, we can get the Orange one to visit and name the water.

[–] Remember_the_tooth@lemmy.world 1 points 15 minutes ago

Don't know why you got downvoted over this. I love Pluto, too. I don't think it's a planet, but I'm not going to get fighty over it. For most of us, it's a semantics issues. I don't think I've actually encountered someone arguing that Pluto has, in fact, cleared it's orbit despite evidence to the contrary. Most of us don't care about that. Cosmologists do, though. They get to make the terms for the progress of science, which is important, but it really doesn't make sense to me to engage in any kind of personal conflict over academic hair splitting.

[–] celeste@kbin.earth 27 points 3 hours ago (2 children)

need a voyager 2 orbiter orbiter so the orbiter doesn't get lonely when voyager 2 ignores it

[–] Klear@piefed.world 10 points 2 hours ago

Also a crewed Pluto flyby orbiter.

[–] digdig@piefed.social 0 points 1 hour ago

Perhaps Voyager 3 as 2 happened already.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYNIsgDrIRE

Although you might need to slingshot of Jupiter and Saturn at the right time.

It amazes me how our greatest minds were able to work this out with the technology and understanding they had.