Voyager 1 sends strange signals from beyond the solar system. Scientists are confused.
Spending 45 years traveling through the solar system is really a number on a spaceship.
From NASA Journey 1 the mission was launched in 1977, launched into what scientists call interstellar space in 2012 and keeps going – the spacecraft is now 14.5 billion miles (23.3 billion km) away The earth. And while Voyager 1 is still operating normally, scientists on the recent mission noticed that it appeared confused about its position in space without entering safe mode or making a sound. alarm.
“A mystery like this is the equivalent of the course at NASA,” said Suzanne Dodd, project manager for Voyager 1 and its twin, Voyager 2, at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. this phase of the Voyager mission,” declare.
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“Both spacecraft are nearly 45 years old, far beyond what mission planners predicted,” added Dodd. “We’re also in interstellar space – a highly radiating environment that no spacecraft has ever flown into before.”
The problem involved Voyager 1’s attitude matching and control system, or AACS, which helps keep the spacecraft and its antennas in the right direction. And AACS seems to be working fine, as the spacecraft is receiving commands, acting on them, and sending scientific data back to Earth with normal signal strength. However, AACS is sending junk telemetry data to the spacecraft’s processor.
The NASA statement did not specify when the problem began or how long it had lasted.
The agency said that Voyager staff will continue to investigate the issue and try to fix or adapt it. It’s a slow process, as signals from Earth currently take 20 hours and 33 minutes to reach Spacecraft 1; receiving the spacecraft’s response carries the same delay.
NASA says the twin probe Voyager 2, also launched in 1977, is operating normally. The energy the twin spacecraft can produce is always decreasing, and mission team members have turned off some components to save juice – measures they hope will keep the probes afloat at least until 2025.
“There were some big challenges for the engineering team,” said Dodd. “But I think if there’s a way to solve this problem with AACS, our team will figure it out.”
Email Meghan Bartels at mbartels@space.com or follow her on Twitter @megahanbartels. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and more Facebook.
https://www.livescience.com/voyager-1-telemetry-issue Voyager 1 sends strange signals from beyond the solar system. Scientists are confused.
