Pioneer 10 (originally designated Pioneer F) is an American space probe, that completed the first mission to the planet Jupiter. Thereafter, Pioneer 10 became the first spacecraft to achieve escape velocity from the Solar System. Pioneer 10 was assembled around a hexagonal satellite bus with a 2.74 meters (9 ft 0 in) diameter parabolic dish high-gain antenna, and the spacecraft was spin stabilized around the axis of the antenna. Its power was supplied by four radioisotope thermoelectric generators that provided a combined 155 watts at launch. This project was conducted by the NASA Ames Research Center in California, and the probe was manufactured by the now defunct TRW Inc. It was launched on March 2, 1972, by an Atlas-Centaur expendable vehicle from Cape Canaveral, Florida. Between July 15, 1972, and February 15, 1973, it became the first spacecraft to traverse the asteroid belt. Photography of Jupiter began November 6, 1973, at a range of 25,000,000 kilometers (16,000,000 mi), and a total of
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