Voyager 1 Detects Interstellar Plasma Hum

What I found most interesting about that is that as the Sun and our whole solar system move through interstellar space, Voyager I is out there travelling with us, but is now slightly ahead of the Sun, meeting any anomalies first before we do. I hadn't appreciated that before.
 
It is amazing. What doesn't shock me is that something designed about 50 years ago is still working Fine after 44 years in space...
 
Does anyone have the calculation for how long it takes a communication signal to reach us from voyager 1 at the distance of 14.1 billion miles away?

Wikipedia suggest 20 'plus' hours--however that seems too fast and I didn't check to see when that page was last updated.
 
20+ hours sounds about right. Maybe a bit more. Someone on the radio said it was "a bit under" a day's travel time...
 
It is amazing. What doesn't shock me is that something designed about 50 years ago is still working Fine after 44 years in space...
If you think about it, the probe managed to survive lift-off and all the gravitational and em shenanigans of the planets and moons. Since then it has been in a very constant cold dark place in a hard vacuum, with no vibration and only the odd cosmic ray to disturb it. Pretty good environment for ageing electronics.
just waiting for the nuclear battery to run down.
 
20+ hours sounds about right. Maybe a bit more. Someone on the radio said it was "a bit under" a day's travel time...
Does anyone have the calculation for how long it takes a communication signal to reach us from voyager 1 at the distance of 14.1 billion miles away?

Wikipedia suggest 20 'plus' hours--however that seems too fast and I didn't check to see when that page was last updated.
Speed of light = 670,616,629 mph. 14,100,000,000 divided by 670,616,629 = 21.025 hours. Makes trouble shooting slow, but they're built for cold, dark, and vacuum.
 
It is amazing. What doesn't shock me is that something designed about 50 years ago is still working Fine after 44 years in space...
It's probably an advantage that the electronics are not as complicated / sophisticated as they would be if the probe was designed today.

The simpler the better.
 
"is that something designed about 50 years ago is still working Fine after 44 years in space"

We were going to the Moon on a regular basis back then. Must have been something that wasn't in the water.

The hum could be the tip of the iceberg connecting us to digital space. If we can hear it, maybe we can find a way inside of it, as we are already floating in it.
 

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