View Full Version : Voyager 1 Spacecraft Has Left Solar System!!!



Plutonic Panda
09-12-2013, 09:46 PM
''A spacecraft from Earth has left its cosmic backyard and taken its first steps in interstellar space.

After streaking through space for nearly 35 years, NASA's robotic Voyager 1 probe finally left the solar system in August 2012, a study published today (Sept. 12) in the journal Science reports.

"Voyager has boldly gone where no probe has gone before, marking one of the most significant technological achievements in the annals of the history of science, and as it enters interstellar space, it adds a new chapter in human scientific dreams and endeavors," NASA science chief John Grunsfeld said in a statement. "Perhaps some future deep-space explorers will catch up with Voyager, our first interstellar envoy, and reflect on how this intrepid spacecraft helped enable their future."

This is really exciting! Good for them and hopefully the voyage shall continue. . .

http://www.space.com/22729-voyager-1-spacecraft-interstellar-space.html

Plutonic Panda
09-12-2013, 09:48 PM
''LOS ANGELES (AP) — NASA's Voyager 1 probe has left the solar system, boldly going where no machine has gone before.

Thirty-six years after it rocketed away from Earth, the plutonium-powered spacecraft has escaped the sun's influence and is now cruising 11 1/2 billion miles away in interstellar space, or the vast, cold emptiness between the stars, NASA said Thursday.

And just in case it encounters intelligent life out there, it is carrying a gold-plated, 1970s-era phonograph record with multicultural greetings from Earth, photos and songs, including Chuck Berry's "Johnny B. Goode," along with Beethoven, Bach, Mozart and Louis Armstrong.

Never before has a man-made object left the solar system as it is commonly understood.

"We made it," said an ecstatic Ed Stone, the mission's chief scientist, who waited decades for this moment.

NASA celebrated by playing the "Star Trek" theme at a news conference in Washington.

Voyager 1 actually made its exit more than a year ago, scientists said. But since there's no "Welcome to Interstellar Space" sign out there, NASA waited for more evidence before concluding that the probe had in fact broken out of the hot plasma bubble surrounding the planets.

Voyager 1, which is about the size of a small car, is drifting in a part of the universe littered with the remnants of ancient star explosions.

It will study exotic particles and other phenomena and will radio the data back to Earth, where the Voyager team awaits the starship's discoveries. It takes about 17 hours for its signal to reach Earth.

While Voyager 1 may have left the solar system as most people understand it, it still has hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years to go before bidding adieu to the last icy bodies that make up our neighborhood.

At the rate it is going, it would take 40,000 years to reach the nearest star, Alpha Centauri.

Voyager 1's odyssey began in 1977 when the spacecraft and its twin, Voyager 2, were launched on a tour of the gas giant planets of the solar system.

View gallery."
This artist rendering released by NASA shows NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft barreling through space. Th …
After beaming back dazzling postcard views of Jupiter's giant red spot and Saturn's shimmering rings, Voyager 2 hopscotched to Uranus and Neptune. Meanwhile, Voyager 1 used Saturn as a gravitational slingshot to power itself past Pluto.

Last year, scientists monitoring Voyager 1 noticed strange happenings that suggested the spacecraft had broken through: Charged particles streaming from the sun suddenly vanished. Also, there was a spike in galactic cosmic rays bursting in from the outside.

Since there was no detectable change in the direction of the magnetic field lines, the team assumed the far-flung craft was still in the heliosphere, or the vast bubble of charged particles around the sun.

The Voyager team patiently waited for a change in magnetic field direction — thought to be the telltale sign of a cosmic border crossing.

But in the meantime, a chance solar eruption that shook Voyager I last spring provided the scientists with the data they needed, convincing them the boundary had been crossed in August of last year.

With the new data, "it took us 10 seconds to realize we were in interstellar space," said Don Gurnett, a Voyager scientist at the University of Iowa who led the new research, published online in the journal Science.

Not everyone is on board.

The new observations are fascinating, but "it's premature to judge," said Lennard Fisk, a space science professor at the University of Michigan and former NASA associate administrator who was not part of the team. "Can we wait a little while longer? Maybe this picture will clear up the farther we go."

Fisk was bothered by the absence of a change in magnetic field direction.

Voyager 2 trails behind at 9 1/2 billion miles from the sun. It may take another three years before Voyager 2 joins its twin on the other side. Eventually, the Voyagers will run out of nuclear fuel and will have to power down their instruments, perhaps by 2025.

Until then, Voyager 1 is "the little spacecraft that could," said mission project manager Suzanne Dodd of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "We keep on going."

From Yahoo: NASA: Voyager 1 probe has left the solar system (http://news.yahoo.com/nasa-voyager-1-probe-left-solar-system-181643361.html)

Plutonic Panda
09-12-2013, 09:49 PM
Cool rendering

http://l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/S4XuMoAAcWOPDZ6yzTPbKQ--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTY5NjtweW9mZj0wO3E9OD U7dz05NjA-/http://media.zenfs.com/en_us/News/ap_webfeeds/00c008dbcb3b321e3d0f6a706700db27.jpg

RadicalModerate
09-12-2013, 09:54 PM
Sure hope that it doesn't smash into, and leave an annoying dot on, the windshield of a passing Death Star.

Plutonic Panda
09-12-2013, 10:05 PM
Sure hope that it doesn't smash into, and leave an annoying dot on, the windshield of a passing Death Star.Sort of like this frog?

http://l3.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/ZjQyUeUdtYcVVxHC0P9xpA--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Zmk9ZmlsbDtoPTUwMTtweW9mZj0wO3E9OD U7dz02Njc-/http://l.yimg.com/os/publish-images/news/2013-09-12/b824620b-1a56-4dc7-9728-984cfa6fd5a6_space-frog-nasa.jpg

''A frog was caught on camera during the launch of NASA's Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer spacecraft at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport in Wallops Island, Va., on Friday.

Jeremy Eggers, a spokesman for the facility, confirmed the veracity of the image of the airborne frog captured by NASA’s remote cameras.

"The photo team confirms the frog is real and was captured in a single frame by one of the remote cameras used to photograph the launch," NASA said. "The condition of the frog, however, is uncertain."

At the very least, there is a possibility the frog is still alive.

Frog photobombs NASA launch (http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/frog-photobombs-nasa-launch-170951498.html)

RadicalModerate
09-12-2013, 10:09 PM
Gotta ask . . . When, exactly, did frogs take flight?
(and I'm not talking about that french balloonist)
Or even develop the ability to jump that high?

I think that is an extra small, proto-nano frog clinging to the lens of the camera.
It's the only logical explanation.

Plutonic Panda
09-12-2013, 10:17 PM
Gotta ask . . . When, exactly, did frogs take flight?
(and I'm not talking about that french balloonist)
Or even develop the ability to jump that high?

I think that is an extra small, proto-nano frog clinging to the lens of the camera.
It's the only logical explanation.That possibility can't be ruled out.

http://assets.diylol.com/hfs/9c2/bf9/0a4/resized/ancient-aliens-invisible-something-meme-generator-i-m-not-saying-it-was-aliens-but-it-was-aliens-c549c7.jpg

OKCisOK4me
09-12-2013, 11:57 PM
This is pretty cool. Which do you think aliens will receive first? The actual space craft OR transmission signals of movies that had the space craft featured in it?

poe
09-13-2013, 04:30 AM
I like this story, but we really need to launch a follow-up spacecraft containing an iPod and iTunes gift card. I'm afraid extraterrestrials might not have a record player.

RadicalModerate
09-13-2013, 05:31 AM
"Mr. Spock . . . Is that a FROG?"
http://www.theskyline.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/vger.jpg
"No Captain. It is a VGER."

SoonerDave
09-13-2013, 07:34 AM
"Mr. Spock . . . Is that a FROG?"
http://www.theskyline.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/vger.jpg
"No Captain. It is a VGER."

Dang it, Rad, you beat me to the V'GER reference!!!!!!!!

OKCisOK4me
09-13-2013, 01:54 PM
I like Starman...where they pull out the golden record. It's not like they really need a record player to play it if they're technologically supreme.

kevinpate
09-13-2013, 03:11 PM
To the Journey!

Mel
09-13-2013, 06:21 PM
A long and productive life to you Voyager!

RadicalModerate
09-13-2013, 06:23 PM
I like this story, but we really need to launch a follow-up spacecraft containing an iPod and iTunes gift card. I'm afraid extraterrestrials might not have a record player.

Let's not be too hasty here . . .
I think there is a sequel in the works along the lines of The Empire Strikes Back, Son of Sorta.
http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b384/fiebke/IMG_3771.jpg

(well . . . that or The Empire Goes on Strike, Watch Your Back)

(is it The Drum Room that lets you drag in off premises vinyl and actually gives it a spin? off topic. never mind =)

Of course all the threats from The Empire pale in comparison to this.
Something I was all set to buy before the bottom dropped out of the vinyl market.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_FbSDy9bT53I/TR8qJ1bHexI/AAAAAAAABOQ/m3KsWIC9Xm4/s400/rsz_bergmann_magne.jpg
Linear Tracking. Too cool. Plus I got tired of sweeping up all the vinyl shards and shavings accumulating on the rug under the turntable that brought the room together.

mugofbeer
09-13-2013, 07:14 PM
Little did I know when I saw it blast off from Cape Kennedy when I was a teenager playing in a softball tournament in Satellite Beach, FL, that it would be the first earth man-made thing to leave the solar system.

RadicalModerate
09-13-2013, 07:34 PM
. . . and, quite possibly the last . . .
unless, of course, we all get behind funding NASA instead of infrastucture (like highways and bridges and whatnot).

(Note to Midtowner [in anticipation of objection]): Yeah . . . I know what a false dichotomy is too . . . =)

Did I forget to express my appreciation/say thanx to PlutoP for this thread?
Probably I did.
Thanks.

bluedogok
09-13-2013, 09:15 PM
Voyager 2 is supposed to break through in about 3 years.

Larry OKC
09-16-2013, 04:17 PM
. . . and, quite possibly the last . . .
unless, of course, we all get behind funding NASA instead of infrastucture (like highways and bridges and whatnot).

(Note to Midtowner [in anticipation of objection]): Yeah . . . I know what a false dichotomy is too . . . =)

Did I forget to express my appreciation/say thanx to PlutoP for this thread?
Probably I did.
Thanks.
shhh, don't tell JustTheFacts... if we start sending more unmanned ones, that will lead to more manned flights which will lead to colonization which will lead to cosmic sprawl...