NASA received message from Voyager 1, humanity’s most distant spacecraft

Voyager 1, which is the most distant object of humanity and continues its journey 24.3 billion kilometers from the Earth, had a problem in November and stopped sending data to the Earth, and became operational again in June. However, in October, NASA announced that the rover went into energy saving mode and experienced a short-term data outage. Now the mission team has managed to communicate with Voyager 1 via a backup radio transmitter.

NASA received message from Voyager 1

Voyager 1, located 15 billion miles or 24.3 billion km away from Earth, went into energy-saving mode and experienced a brief data outage on October 16. NASA’s guess was that this was due to instructions on October 16 telling Voyager 1 to turn off one of its heaters, which resulted in the rover’s error protection system being triggered and the X-band transmitter shutting down.

So NASA didn’t want to risk sending another signal to the X-band transmitter and triggering the failsafe system again. On October 19, communication stopped completely.

Now, according to NASA’s statement, Voyager 1 has managed to communicate again via the S-band radio transmitter, which has been unused since 1981. On October 22, a command was sent to the S-band transmitter and communication with Voyager 1 was reestablished. It is not known exactly what triggered Voyager 1’s failsafe system, but the vehicle had to have enough power to run the heater. NASA states that it may take weeks to find the source of the problem.

The source of the problem is unknown

The fact that Voyager 1 is so far from Earth makes maintenance work challenging. But despite all the difficulties, the spacecraft continues to transmit vital data to Earth from deep space outside the Solar System.

Voyager 1 became the first human-made vehicle to go beyond the Sun’s magnetic field and reach interstellar space in 2012. This vehicle, which collected a lot of data in the depths of space during its 47-year mission, still has the capacity to connect with the Earth. NASA confirmed that after this incident, Voyager went into protection mode and maintained its power, and that this feature designed to protect its health worked successfully.