On 24 October 2006, at 8:34 UTC (4:34 a.m. EDT), NASA’s Mercury-bound MESSENGER spacecraft swung by Venus and came within 2,990 kilometers (1,860 miles) of the surface of Venus. According to the mission’s Principal Investigator Sean Solomon, the second flyby in June 2007 will provide a full suite of scientific observations. For more information click here.

Left: Image of Venus snapped by the Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS) from a distance of about 16.5 million kilometers. Courtesy: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington.