<P> Launched aboard a Titan IVB / Centaur on October 15 , 1997 , Cassini was active in space for nearly 20 years , with 13 years spent orbiting Saturn , studying the planet and its system after entering orbit on July 1 , 2004 . The voyage to Saturn included flybys of Venus ( April 1998 and July 1999 ) , Earth ( August 1999 ) , the asteroid 2685 Masursky , and Jupiter ( December 2000 ) . Its mission ended on September 15 , 2017 , when Cassini 's trajectory took it into Saturn 's upper atmosphere and it burned up in order to prevent any risk of contaminating Saturn 's moons , which might have offered habitable environments to stowaway terrestrial microbes on the spacecraft . The mission is widely perceived to have been successful beyond expectation . Cassini - Huygens has been described by NASA 's Planetary Science Division Director as a `` mission of firsts '' , that has revolutionized human understanding of the Saturn system , including its moons and rings , and our understanding of where life might be found in the Solar System . </P>
<P> Launched aboard a Titan IVB / Centaur on October 15 , 1997 , Cassini was active in space for nearly 20 years , with 13 years spent orbiting Saturn , studying the planet and its system after entering orbit on July 1 , 2004 . The voyage to Saturn included flybys of Venus ( April 1998 and July 1999 ) , Earth ( August 1999 ) , the asteroid 2685 Masursky , and Jupiter ( December 2000 ) . Its mission ended on September 15 , 2017 , when Cassini 's trajectory took it into Saturn 's upper atmosphere and it burned up in order to prevent any risk of contaminating Saturn 's moons , which might have offered habitable environments to stowaway terrestrial microbes on the spacecraft . The mission is widely perceived to have been successful beyond expectation . Cassini - Huygens has been described by NASA 's Planetary Science Division Director as a `` mission of firsts '' , that has revolutionized human understanding of the Saturn system , including its moons and rings , and our understanding of where life might be found in the Solar System . </P>
when did the cassini spacecraft arrived at saturn
when did the cassini spacecraft arrived at saturn
July 1 , 2004
July 1 , 2004