Over the last several month , the most distant human - made target has been in trouble : Voyager 1 was still in communication with Earth , but scientist were receive nothing but binary gibberish . The site lookedextremely serious – so serious that might have spelled the end of the decennary - foresightful mission . But thanks to hard work , the squad has now been able-bodied to understand the military issue on - add-in and even find a fix .
For the first time since November 14 , Voyager 1 is transmitting science and engineering data that can be empathise . At the gist of the problem is the Flight Data System ( FDS ) , one of the investigation ’s onboard figurer . This equipment packages all the datum – from the onboard system or from the scientific discipline systems – before transmit them to Earth .
In March , the team beam a poke to the ballistic capsule and got back another uncanny message . But that fourth dimension , it contained everything inthe FDS memory , all of its computer code as well as scientific discipline and engineering science data . From that , they were able to understand the problem and find a solution : There is a exclusive faulty splintering that stores a portion of the FDS memory and some of its code .
We ca n’t simply repair a chip on a ballistic capsule that is 24 billion kilometers ( 15 billion knot ) from Earth . So the team had to migrate the affected code elsewhere , and correct the code so that the organisation would officiate and not end up using the damage portion .
give its space , it ingest a prospicient time to get anything to the probe and back . Voyager 1 is 22.5 loose - hours away . They send the first fix on April 18 , and on April 20 got a reply – and it look like it work . They had a unmortgaged readout .
This is extremely skilful news after month of challenge oeuvre and uncertainty . The squad is at work to complete the full restructure of the FDS software . Once that is completed , Voyager 1 will once again re-start its scientific commission collect datum from interstellar space .
Voyager 1 and its twin spacecraft Voyager 2 are the only two human - made objects to cross the heliopause , the region where the solar wind and the interstellar wind are in labyrinthine sense . For age now , they have been locomote in interstellar space sending data back to Earth . And hopefully , they will uphold to do so for a long fourth dimension .
NASA’splanned budgetfor the come years show commitment to keep the Voyager foreign mission go well past its 50th anniversary in 2027 .
