Useless information

[Dustydog]

The boffins will appreciate this. I was surprised that 41 years on data is still being sent back to Earth!

Voyager 1 left earth on September 5, 1977 - this year marks its 40th anniversary. In August, 2012, 35 years after leaving Earth, Voyager 1 officially left the Solar System and is now traveling in Interstellar space. The craft is currently over 20 trillion kilometers away (about 140 AU - that is, 140 times the distance from the earth to the sun)! After visiting Jupiter, Voyager 1 was supposed to go on and visit Pluto after Saturn. However, after Pioneer 10 discovered that Saturn's moon Titan had an atmosphere, Voyager 1 was reprogrammed to fly by and investigate, causing it to miss the Pluto flyby.
The second farthest spacecraft is Pioneer 10 at 114 AU. Traveling slower than Voyager 1, it was passed in 1998. Voyager's twin - Voyager 2 is at 113 AU, and should pass the distance of Pioneer 10 in the next year. Voyager 2 actually left Earth before Voyager 1. However, it took a longer route out of the solar system so it could visit Uranus and Neptune.
Though many of the scientists and technicians that created Voyager 1 have already retired, the probe itself remains working and in contact with earth through the Deep Space Network. What a trooper!

 

[Parksy]

The boffins will appreciate this. I was surprised that 41 years on data is still being sent back to Earth!

Voyager 1 left earth on September 5, 1977 - this year marks its 40th anniversary.

Splitting hairs when we consider the distance travelled I know, but this year will mark it's 44th anniversary.
My second son was born on February 5th 1981 and yesterday was his 40th birthday 😊 🚀✨

 

[Dustydog]

Maths error Parksy🤪🤪🤪Yes 44 years this year

 

[otherclive]

What I would like to know is where will it go after it departs our universe? What is beyond ?

 

[Dustydog]

Captain James T Kirk and the Starship Enterprise😁😁

 

[Buckman]

Interesting. Thanks.

 

[otherclive]

Captain James T Kirk and the Starship Enterprise😁😁

Possibly travelling alongside Dan Dare. But if the Universe is expanding , whose space or dimension are we trespassing on?

 

[Dustydog]

You beat me Clive. How about the Mysterons?

 

[ProfJohnL]

What I would like to know is where will it go after it departs our universe? What is beyond ?

That is one of the great imponderables.

 

[Beachball]

Captain James T Kirk and the Starship Enterprise😁😁

Hi Dusty my wife loves watching Starship Enterprise it very interesting

 

[Hutch]

But where do things go to, when they get sucked into a Black hole, Are they StarGates. ???👽

 

[Gabsgrandad]

Still receiving signals from it? - How many 'million' miles? -- And yet on a lot of sites here on earth we struggle to get a TV signal a few miles away!!

 

[Sam Vimes]

Thanks for this reminder. I worked in the Defence and Aerospace industry and can remember going to a talk in the early 80s given by one of the lead engineers on the Voyager program. It was about the problems in designing electronics for deep space applications. The technology chosen was at a level below that available in the commercial world mainly because of power limitations and the environment in space applications. Radiation etc.

I can remember little of the meeting except for one point relating to the amount of memory the onboard systems had. Not very much and the software engineers had pretty much filled it up without realising that maybe somewhen in its life cycle it may need some updates - course corrections etc. - and that may need some extra memory and of a type that could be reprorammed. Of course this was picked up in a review and modifications made accordingly and given its success they must have worked.

I had some of the early pictures from our solar system given to me by JPL but sadly I've lost them over the years. Still they are available on the internet somewhere.

 

[Guzzilazz]

What I would like to know is where will it go after it departs our universe? What is beyond ?

If you look at the astrophysics, what's beyond is "mainly nothing"...

 

[otherclive]

If you look at the astrophysics, what's beyond is "mainly nothing"...

I read Stephen Hawkins “The brief history of time” which wasn’t particularly brief and took me a long time to finish. At the end I’m not that sure I really understood the theme that well. But I’ve seen at least five theories but that’s all they are. What there does seem to be a consensus on is that physicists can only track back into the Big Bang to within a few seconds of it happening 13.8 billion years ago. Beyond that they don’t have a definitive answer for what constituted the initiation of the Big Bang as even quantum physics breaks down under those conditions. So I guess if as you say we are expanding into mainly nothing it’s a bit like encroaching onto someone else’s pitch with your awning and windbreaks etc 😁

 

[Gabsgrandad]

Can there be 'nothing? :... Or has there to be 'something? ...... And if there is 'something, what came before it? But more important is when does it end? And if it ends where does it go? D'yer know I'm not going to worry about it and never will try to explain it! :........ And whoever does I certainly won't believe 'em!

 

[ProfJohnL]

...I can remember little of the meeting except for one point relating to the amount of memory the onboard systems had. Not very much and the software engineers had pretty much filled it up without realising that maybe somewhen in its life cycle it may need some updates - course corrections etc. - and that may need some extra memory and of a type that could be reprorammed. ...

I'm sure Amazon Prime have a local depot out there and can deliver new memory chips same day !

 

[Buckman]

Can there be 'nothing? :... Or has there to be 'something? ...... And if there is 'something, what came before it? But more important is when does it end? And if it ends where does it go? D'yer know I'm not going to worry about it and never will try to explain it! :........ And whoever does I certainly won't believe 'em!

Even nothing is something!