Voyager 1 wakes up after going silent 15 billion miles away

(CLO) The 47-year-old spacecraft Voyager 1 has reconnected with NASA after a technical problem caused a loss of communication.

Voyager 1 is currently using a radio transmitter that hasn't been used since 1981 to send signals back to Earth. Launched in 1977, to extend the spacecraft's lifespan and continue receiving data from it, scientists have had to disconnect some parts of the spacecraft to reduce power consumption.

Voyager 1 spacecraft. Photo: NASA

Voyager 1 is currently the farthest man-made object from Earth, operating beyond the heliosphere — the region where the magnetic field and particles from the Sun extend beyond the orbit of Pluto — where its instruments collect samples directly from interstellar space.

Occasionally, engineers will have to send commands to Voyager 1 to activate its heating system, which can warm up parts damaged by prolonged exposure to cosmic radiation. Bruce Waggoner, Voyager mission assurance manager, said the heat can help restore these parts, improving the spacecraft’s performance.

The messages were sent to Voyager from NASA's mission control center in California. NASA used a huge array of radio antennas on Earth to communicate with Voyager 1 and the Voyager 2 probes, as well as other spacecraft exploring our Solar System.

Voyager 1 will then send data back to Earth for confirmation. The one-way travel time of the signal is about 23 hours.

When scientists sent a command to the spacecraft to turn on the heater on October 16, the spacecraft automatically turned off some other instruments. The team discovered the problem when it did not receive a response over the Deep Space Network on October 18.

Voyager 1 has used one of its two radio transmitters, called X-band, for decades. The other transmitter, called S-band, has not been used since 1981 because its signal is much weaker than X-band.

By October 19, communications with Voyager 1 appeared to have been completely cut off. The team believes that the fault protection system was activated two more times, possibly shutting down the X-band transmitter and switching the spacecraft to the S-band transmitter, which uses less power.

Although the team didn't think they could pick up the weak signal from the S-band transmitter due to Voyager 1's great distance, engineers eventually picked up the signal.

If the team could repair the X-band transmitter, the spacecraft could send data back to Earth to explain what went wrong, Waggoner said.

Ha Trang (according to CNN)

Source: https://www.congluan.vn/tau-vu-tru-voyager-1-cach-xa-trai-dat-15-ty-dam-bat-ngo-thuc-day-post319726.html