Extract from ABC News
NASA's giant dish antenna in Canberra is on the lookout for signals from the Voyager 2 spacecraft, after flight controllers accidentally severed communications more than a week ago.
Key points:
- NASA operators mistakenly tilted Voyager 2's antenna 2 degrees away from Earth
- The spacecraft will automatically reset in October which should re-establish communications
- Voyager 2 was launched in 1977 and only designed to last 12 years
The mistake from NASA operators only shifted the spacecraft's antenna by 2 degrees, but that was enough for it to lose contact with the Earth-based tracking station 19 billion kilometres away.
Voyager 2 was launched in 1977 to explore the outer planets, just a couple of weeks ahead of its identical twin, Voyager 1.
Glen Nagle of the Canberra Deep Space Communication Complex told the ABC the erroneous command was sent from a station in California and relayed through Canberra.
"[Glitches] happen from time to time," he said.
"It's always interesting when you have a spacecraft which is coming up to its 46th anniversary in a space mission only designed to last 12 years.
"It is ageing and getting further away from us every single day. We do know we'll lose contact with the spacecraft sometime towards the end of this decade."
In the coming week, the Canberra antenna — operated by CSIRO as part of NASA's Deep Space Network — will bombard Voyager 2's vicinity with the correct command, in hopes it hits its mark, according to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which manages the Voyager missions.
Mr Nagle said Canberra’s sister stations in the northern hemisphere had become completely reliant on the ACT’s antenna, as Voyager 2 was too far south "and from those stations' points of view, the Earth is in the way".
Although the chances of quickly restoring communications are seen as a long shot, the spacecraft will automatically reset in October which should do the trick.
It will continue collecting information in the meantime, ready to beam it down when contact is made.
"We'll hear back from Voyager in October and continue this amazing journey across the solar system and beyond," Mr Nagle said.
He said Voyager 2 was put into hibernation mode during upgrades to the Canberra dish in 2021, causing a similar communications outage.
Voyager 2 passed into interstellar space in 2018.
It and its twin, Voyager 1, are humanity's most distant spacecraft.
"They will both keep travelling, each going a further 1.5 million kilometres away from our Earth each day," Mr Nagle said.
"But even at that amazing speed, they won’t reach the closest stars for another 296,000 years.
"They went to Jupiter and Saturn and they're the only spacecraft to have visited the planets Uranus and Neptune.
"The Voyager spacecraft will never come home. It's a continuing outward journey. We will eventually lose contact with them when the background noise of the universe overwhelms their little signal."
ABC/AP
No comments:
Post a Comment