Voyager 2 skims 3,080 miles over Neptune's north pole and confirms the planet's rings

Voyager 2 launched in 1977 to study Jupiter and Saturn, then kept flying for twelve more years. On August 25, 1989, it passed 4,950 kilometers above Neptune's north pole, the closest the spacecraft had come to any planet since leaving Cape Canaveral in 1977, and confirmed what astronomers had only guessed at: Neptune had rings. The spacecraft also spotted six previously unknown moons and a storm on the scale of Jupiter's Great Red Spot before turning its cameras toward Triton five hours later…