Solar System Timeline of Events

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Solar System

The Solar System consists of the Sun and the astronomical objects gravitationally bound in orbit around it, all of which formed from the collapse of a giant molecular cloud approximately 4.6 billion years ago. The vast majority of the system's mass is in the Sun...

Timeline of Events

1983

6.13.1983

''Pioneer 10'' becomes the first man-made object to leave the solar system.

1989

8.25.1989

Voyager 2 spacecraft makes its closest approach to Neptune, the outermost planet in the Solar System.

2005

1.5.2005

Eris, the largest known dwarf planet in the solar system, is discovered by the team of Michael E. Brown, Chad Trujillo, and David L. Rabinowitz using images originally taken on October 21, 2003, at the Palomar Observatory.

1.15.2005

An intense solar flare blasts X-rays across the solar system.