GOLDSTONE TOUR
Introduction | Pioneer Site | Apollo Site
Gemini Site | Mars Site | Signal Processing Center

<img src="images/pioneer01.jpg" alt="Still Image from Pioneer QTVR Spin" width="555" height="289" hspace="0" vspace="0" border="0"><BR><I>An interactive tour of the Pioneer Site can be viewed using <A HREF="http://www.apple.com/quicktime" TARGET="_blank">QuickTime</A>.</I>

Pioneer Site
The Pioneer site consists of one 26-meter-diameter (85-foot) antenna and is the oldest found at Goldstone. Now decommissioned, the antenna was the first to communicate with deep space probes. The site was named after the early Pioneer missions to the Moon in 1958 and 1959. The antennas were setting records even in 1959 while communicating with Pioneer 4, which was over 650,000 kilometers (over 400,000 miles) away at the time.

Pioneer acted as a back-up to the Apollo missions, including the Apollo 11 Moon-landing mission. It also supported the early years of the Voyager mission.

The Pioneer dish was decommissioned in 1981.