We flew Pioneers 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 and 13. True, all had different missions, but look how many made it to their destinations and fully accomplished their goals.

[The Pioneer 11 Mission ended on 30 September 1995, when the last transmission from the spacecraft was received. Its electrical power source exhausted, the spacecraft could no longer operate any of its scientific instruments, nor point its antenna toward Earth. The spacecraft is headed toward the constellation of Aquila (The Eagle), Northwest of the constellation of Sagittarius.]

Pioneer 10, at a distance of over 7 billion miles away, is still going strong .

Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 were launched in 1977. It's wonderful to read about the accomplishments of those two.

As of January 2001, Voyager 1 was at a distance of 12 Billion Kilometers (80 AU) from the sun and Voyager 2 at a distance of 9.4 Billion kilometers (62.7 AU).

[Voyager 1 is escaping the solar system at a speed of about 3.6 AU per year, 35 degrees out of the ecliptic plan to the north, in the general direction of the Solar Apex (the direction of the Sun's motion relative to nearby stars). Voyager 2 is also escaping the solar system at a speed of about 3.3 AU per year, 48 degrees out of the ecliptic plane to the south.]

We shouldn't miss that Jupiter flyby for PKB or even PKE. As of now, ion propulsion (solar electric propulsion) would not be efficient for such a trip. It would be a loss of very good insurance towards setbacks of ongoing, future types of technology/propulsion if we don't go for the flyby (imho). It's not like we're sending an entire fleet of Pluto-Kuiper orbiters a la Pioneers and even Voyagers.

Europa is much closer and will still be there, unlike Pluto.

Best wishes,

Marcia