Daily Curiosities: Voyager 1 is the Farthest Manmade Object From Earth
POSTED by: on 10/06/2009
In late 1977, two small spacecraft launched from earth and began a mission to visit Jupiter and Saturn and learn more about them. 32 years later, these two spacecraft, called Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 are flying at incredible speeds out of the solar system and into the vast regions of interstellar space; all the while, sending back new data about what they find so far away from our planet. Both spacecraft have now crossed the termination shock and are flying traveling through the Heliosheath, the final layer of the solar system before leaving the Heliosphere and reaching interstellar space.
The spacecraft are powered by radioisotope generators that are expected to provide power until about 2025. However, as the generators lose capacity, various experiments will need to be shutdown in order to conserve power.
It is unknown when the Voyager spacecraft will reach the Heliopause.
Both Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 also carry a small gold plated copper phonographic record (The Voyager Golden Record), containing greetings in various languages, music and pictures. These records are there in case one of the spacecraft is found by extraterrestrial beings, though the chance of this happening is next to nothing.
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