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Mission record

Mariner 5

Also known as Mariner Venus '67, Venus '67, Mariner5

NASA-Office of Space Science Applications · Launched

Explore trajectory

Completed · Success

A refurbished Mariner 4 backup spacecraft converted from a Mars mission to a Venus mission, whose project objectives were to pass within 2000 km of Venus and provide data on the structure of the planet's atmosphere and its radiation and magnetic field environment. It reached Venus on 19 October 1967 with a closest approach at an altitude of 4094 km, was occulted from Earth for approximately 26 minutes, and NSSDCA records that the mission was termed a success. Contact was lost on 4 December 1967 and temporarily regained on 14 October 1968.

Destinations
Launch vehicle
Atlas-Agena D
Launch site
Cape Canaveral, United States
Countries
United States
Mission types
Flyby

Chronology

Mission timeline

  1. Launch

    Launched from Cape Kennedy on an Atlas-Agena D

    The launch/orbital information page prints 1967-06-14T06:01:00Z, recorded at minute precision because it prints a whole minute with zero seconds; the master catalog gives the same time as 06:01:00 UT. That page names the site as the Eastern Test Range of Cape Kennedy while both pages print Cape Canaveral, United States under Launch Site.

    Earth

  2. Flyby

    Venus flyby at an altitude of 4094 km

    The launch/orbital information page prints a Venus flyby with a closest approach time of 1967-10-19 17:34:56 and a periapsis of 4094.00 km; the master catalog gives the same time and altitude and adds that Venus was then approximately 79.5 million km from Earth and that the spacecraft was occulted from Earth for approximately 26 minutes.

    Venus

  3. Loss of contact

    Contact lost on 4 December 1967

    The master catalog records that contact was lost on 4 December 1967.

  4. Milestone

    Contact temporarily regained on 14 October 1968

    The master catalog records that contact was temporarily regained on 14 October 1968, and that the spacecraft is now in heliocentric orbit.

  5. Milestone

    Mid-course correction, a 17.66 second burn, on 19 June

    The master catalog records a mid-course correction, a 17.66 second burn, made on 19 June. Carried without a timestamp because the sentence that prints the day prints no year.

Mission architecture

Vehicles

  • Mariner 5 · Spacecraft

    Destinations: Venus

Trajectory record

Trajectory dataset not yet available

No verified trajectory dataset is committed for this mission, so Mission Atlas renders no path.

Provenance

Sources

Each source is listed once and labeled with the mission, event, trajectory, or destination/body context it supports.

Data verified through September 3, 2026