1997

Cassini–Huygens

Cassini–Huygens launches from Cape Canaveral

The rocket rose at 4:43 in the morning, two days after wind and ground-system trouble stopped the first attempt — and even it could not throw Cassini straight at Saturn.

Liftoff at 08:43 UTC

A Titan IVB/Centaur lifted Cassini–Huygens from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, at 08:43 UTC on 15 October 1997 — 4:43 a.m. local time.

The planned attempt two days earlier, on 13 October, had been scrubbed because of upper-level winds and ground-equipment or computer concerns.

The payload combined NASA's Cassini Saturn orbiter, ESA's Huygens Titan probe and a high-gain antenna supplied by the Italian Space Agency.

Forty-two minutes to separation

The Titan and Centaur completed their burns, and the Centaur separated from the spacecraft 42 minutes and 40 seconds after liftoff.

Cassini established communications through NASA's Deep Space Network station near Canberra, Australia, and returned good signals.

The stack weighed 5,712 kilograms — 12,593 pounds — at launch, counting fuel, Huygens and the adapter.

Too heavy to aim at Saturn

The launch did not put the spacecraft on a direct route. Cassini's mass required two Venus flybys plus Earth and Jupiter gravity assists, and the first encounter ahead of it was Venus.

The cruise to Saturn ran roughly 6.7 years.

One figure that circulates with this launch is the wrong one: $3.26 billion was approximately the original projected total, while NASA's completed-mission accounting gives $3.9 billion — $2.5 billion before launch and $1.4 billion after.

Sources

Researched 24 Aug 2026 6 sources not yet audited Date corrected

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Date corrected. The research places this at 1997-10-15.