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Space

Voyager 1, First Craft in Interstellar Space, May Have Gone Dark (nytimes.com) 80

Posted by msmash from the end-of-an-era dept.
The 46-year-old probe, which flew by Jupiter and Saturn in its youth and inspired earthlings with images of the planet as a "Pale Blue Dot," hasn't sent usable data from interstellar space in months. From a report: When Voyager 1 launched in 1977, scientists hoped it could do what it was built to do and take up-close images of Jupiter and Saturn. It did that -- and much more. Voyager 1 discovered active volcanoes, moons and planetary rings, proving along the way that Earth and all of humanity could be squished into a single pixel in a photograph, a "pale blue dot," as the astronomer Carl Sagan called it. It stretched a four-year mission into the present day, embarking on the deepest journey ever into space. Now, it may have bid its final farewell to that faraway dot.

Voyager 1, the farthest man-made object in space, hasn't sent coherent data to Earth since November. NASA has been trying to diagnose what the Voyager mission's project manager, Suzanne Dodd, called the "most serious issue" the robotic probe has faced since she took the job in 2010. The spacecraft encountered a glitch in one of its computers that has eliminated its ability to send engineering and science data back to Earth. The loss of Voyager 1 would cap decades of scientific breakthroughs and signal the beginning of the end for a mission that has given shape to humanity's most distant ambition and inspired generations to look to the skies.
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Voyager 1, First Craft in Interstellar Space, May Have Gone Dark More

Voyager 1, First Craft in Interstellar Space, May Have Gone Dark

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  • Veger Is Coming Back To Get Us (Score:5, Funny)

    by zenlessyank ( 748553 ) on Thursday March 07, 2024 @12:21PM (#64297360)

    It is being assimilated as we type.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by v1 ( 525388 )

      hello, customer service? Can you send a tech to come out and look at my space craft, I think something's wrong with it.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Tablizer ( 95088 )

        hello, customer service? Can you send a tech to come out and look at my space craft, I think something's wrong with it.

        Musk: "Sure, write us a check for 2.5 billion, and we'll be right up!"

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by grimr ( 88927 )

        hello, customer service? Can you send a tech to come out and look at my space craft, I think something's wrong with it.

        Have you tried turning it off and on again?

    • No. That was Voyager 6. We have to launch at least four more probes if we want to get Vger to come home in 300 years.

  • I hope someone fired the thrusters (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    to change directions. Otherwise, some advanced alien civilization that loves bipedal meat for dinner can find it and trace it right back to us.
    • if I recall correctly, there is a map on the thing telling anyone how to find us.
      • I think we're pretty safe, if you were an advanced civilisation capable of interstellar travel would you want to travel vast distances to visit this dump?

    • A civilization capable of interstellar travel is very likely also capable of growing as much cultured human-meat in a vat as they want. Itâ(TM)s much cheaper to just capture a few biopsy samples and send them back to Betelgeuse then to slaughter, freeze-pack, and ship every human trillions of miles.

      • A civilization capable of interstellar travel is very likely also capable of growing as much cultured human-meat in a vat as they want. Itâ(TM)s much cheaper to just capture a few biopsy samples and send them back to Betelgeuse then to slaughter, freeze-pack, and ship every human trillions of miles.

        While this is true, the latter is a much better movie.

        • While this is true, the latter is a much better movie.

          It was a mini series, regular series, and a reboot called "V".

          • While this is true, the latter is a much better movie.

            It was a mini series, regular series, and a reboot called "V".

            I loved the original mini-series V. The reboot, despite hiring an epic cast, fell flat on its face for me and I gave up somewhere after four episodes or so.

      • A civilization capable of interstellar travel is very likely also capable of growing as much cultured human-meat in a vat as they want. ItÃ(TM)s much cheaper to just capture a few biopsy samples and send them back to Betelgeuse then to slaughter, freeze-pack, and ship every human trillions of miles.

        Yeah, but where's the fun in that?

        You know...thrill of the hunt, etc....?

    • I'm hoping aliens return it with a fine for littering interstellar space. That would be ironic.

  • Not saying aliens installed a paywall on the probe (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tablizer ( 95088 ) on Thursday March 07, 2024 @12:28PM (#64297382) Journal

    ...but some foul beings did install one on NY Times.

  • An alien race has found it and started fiddling around with its insides.

    • An alien race has found it and started fiddling around with its insides.

      Oumuamua intercepted it and took it in as a curiosity, wondering where it came from since it only saw a grave-looking junkyard in the Sol system it passed through.

      • `Oumuamua is heading out in the direction of Pegasus ; Voyager 1 in the direction of Ophiuchus. They will never again be as close together as they are today.

        Sorry - nice idea though.

  • Useful (Score:5, Interesting)

    by JBMcB ( 73720 ) on Thursday March 07, 2024 @12:32PM (#64297400)

    Even if it isn't sending useful data back, the fact that it's sending anything back at all is useful as we can analyze the signal itself to better design later deep-space probes. In any case, it's nuclear batteries are expected to not provide enough electricity to power the transmitter sometime around 2030, so we've got our money's worth out of it.

    • Indeed, the Doppler data is still useful, and maybe/hopefully the computer error is systemic of the bits switch type - I doubt though.

  • Deep into wormhole
    Ancient aliens adopt
    Returns for the whales

    (Yes I know... roll with it)

  • NPR Story Link, no #@!%$ paywall! (Score:4, Informative)

    by Tablizer ( 95088 ) on Thursday March 07, 2024 @12:47PM (#64297444) Journal

    https://www.npr.org/2024/03/06... [npr.org]

    The best source of news is alleged "socialist news"? Capitalist news is slippin'

    • I wouldn't say NYT leans pro-conservative / capitalist.

      Not until it comes to unpaid redistribution of their output.

  • Isn't this how V'ger is born?

  • Is it really? (Score:3)

    by TrumpShaker ( 4855909 ) on Thursday March 07, 2024 @01:42PM (#64297590)
    Has it really gone dark if it's still transmitting?

    "It basically stopped talking to us in a coherent manner," says Suzanne Dodd of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, who has been the project manager for the Voyager interstellar mission since 2010. "It's a serious problem."
    Source: https://www.npr.org/2024/03/06... [npr.org]

    So, it's incoherent...or....alien teenagers hacked it to transmit a link to their "leet warez"
  • by radioactive decay (RTG) or by distance it was inevitable that we would lose Voyager I eventually it's a sad day especially for those of who remember seeing the planet science data in grade school. and a loss for science but this day sadly was going to come.
    • And even sadder for the few of us left who were adults when it was launched, and remember the glory days of the planetary encounters.

  • Given today's technology, I am curious how long it would take another space probe to reach the same point in space? It would be also be interesting what extra science it could do along the way?

    • Today's technology likely wouldn't make any difference in terms of the spacecraft's speed. After any spacecraft either gets into orbit or places it on a trajectory away from the earth, it simply coasts at whatever speed its engines got it to after they shut off. To make it go faster, it would have to keep burning fuel to accelerate and rocket fuel is extremely expensive to launch because it's heavy. There's also diminishing returns because carrying more and more fuel to go faster eventually would make the s

      • I'll disagree a little bit: we have heavy lift rockets bringing mass to orbit at a greater rate than any time in history and new larger and more efficient rockets on the cusp of being brought to use, with next generations planned for the future. Space launch technology -- the actual raw launching of mass to orbit, where it can be useful -- has advanced. And mass to orbit means more fuel -- if we really wanted to get something out there faster.

        And that's where our statements arrive at the same conclusion:

        • ... we have heavy lift rockets bringing mass to orbit at a greater rate than any time in history ...

          The rate at which this happens is irrelevant to the point of making spacecraft travel faster after getting out of Earth's gravity well.

          ... and more efficient rockets on the cusp of being brought to use, with next generations planned for the future ...

          I suggest you read the answers to this question [stackexchange.com].

      • ION engines could make a huge improvement in speed vs.Voyager probes.

        https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/SMART-1/The_magic_of_ion_engines

        They deliver about ten times as much thrust per kilo of propellant used.

    • What technology did you have in mind?

      We have far better control systems and radios and things, but making rockets that don't blow themselves to kingdom come if you look at them the wrong way is as hard in 2024 as it was in 1977. Or for that matter, 1969.

      ...laura

      • What technology did you have in mind?

        We have far better control systems and radios and things, but making rockets that don't
        blow themselves to kingdom come if you look at them the wrong way is as hard in 2024 as it was in 1977. Or
        for that matter, 1969.

        ...laura

        Ion engines and derivatives, for propulsion. Improved cameras, computing and radio. Probably some new sensor types too, maybe for sampling any amount of gas that might be in the zone beyond the solar system ?

  • A four year mission (Score:5, Insightful)

    by whitroth ( 9367 ) <whitroth@5-BOHRcent.us minus physicist> on Thursday March 07, 2024 @02:13PM (#64297662) Homepage

    That's lasted 46 years. Ah, yes, put together by NASA federal employees, to whom the mission mattered, not ROI.

    • Pfft. They probably missed 4th quarter shareholder objectives.

      Obviously they weren't pursuing dedication to cost rationalization and lean execution for disruptive innovation, nor fostering agile adaptive business models to unlock new avenues for revenue generation.
  • I'm old enough to remember when they launched, I've followed their discoveries all my life and now I'm a little sad that it's coming to an end.

  • If a speck of dust hit that thing, it would do some serious damage, given the velocities involved. It's really a wonder it's gone this long without something going wrong!

  • ...long, music filled scenes of the Enterprise leaving space dock.

  • It's weird, it's just a piece of tech - albeit an amazing one - but...

    It's something that went up when I was a child, and it's been alive almost as long as I have. The Voyager probes feel like they're part of my life, probably like the internet for younger folks I guess. I've always known them, I've always marveled at them. And now one of them is dying and it feels like losing something personal.

  • I, for one, welcome our new V'ger overlords.

  • Voyager's sole purpose now is to make contact with an alien civilizations. That was the government's plan and design for when it passes Pluto... which it now has.

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