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NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft experienced a computer glitch that caused some communications disruption between the 46-year-old probe and the mission team on Earth.
Engineers are currently trying to solve this problem as aging spacecraft explore unexplored cosmic regions throughout the outer reaches of the solar system.
Voyager 1 is currently the furthest spacecraft from Earth, at approximately 15 billion miles (24 billion kilometers); its twin, Voyager 2, has moved more than 12 billion miles (20 billion kilometers) from our planet. Both are in interstellar space and are the only spacecraft operating beyond the heliosphere, the sun’s bubble of magnetic fields and particles that extends far beyond Pluto’s orbit.
Originally designed to last five years, the Voyager probes are the two longest-operating spacecraft in history. Their exceptionally long lifetimes mean that both spacecraft are providing additional information about our solar system and beyond after achieving their preliminary goal of flying past Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune decades ago.
But their unexpectedly long journey was not without its challenges.
Voyager 1 has three onboard computers, including a flight data system that collects information from the spacecraft’s science instruments and combines it with engineering data that reflects Voyager 1’s current health status. Mission control on Earth receives this data in binary code or a string. ones and zeros.
But Voyager 1’s flight data system now appears to be stuck on auto-repeat, with a scenario reminiscent of the movie “Groundhog Day.”
A long distance glitch
The mission team first noticed this problem on November 14, when the flight data system’s telecommunications unit began sending repeating ones and zeros, as if trapped in a loop.
Although the spacecraft was still able to receive and execute commands transmitted from the mission team, a problem with its telecommunications unit meant that no science or engineering data from Voyager 1 was returned to Earth.
According to NASA, the Voyager team sent commands to the spacecraft over the weekend to restart the flight data system, but no usable data has yet arrived.
Calla Cofield, a media relations specialist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., which manages the mission, said NASA engineers are currently trying to gather more information about the underlying cause of the problem before determining next steps to fix it. The process can take weeks.
Voyager 1 last experienced a similar but not identical problem with its flight data system in 1981, Cofield said, and the current problem does not appear to be linked to other glitches the spacecraft has experienced in recent years.
Because both Voyager probes have experienced new trials, mission team members have only the original manuals written decades ago to refer to, and they fail to account for the challenges the spacecraft faces as it ages.
The Voyager team wants to evaluate all possible consequences before sending any further commands to the spacecraft to ensure their operations are not unexpectedly affected.
Voyager 1 is so far away that commands sent from Earth take 22.5 hours to reach the spacecraft. Additionally, the team must wait 45 hours to receive a response.
Keeping the Voyager probes alive
As the aging twin Voyager probes continue to explore the universe, the team is slowly shutting down the instruments on these “senior citizens” to preserve power and expand their mission, Voyager’s project manager Suzanne Dodd previously told CNN.
Along the way, both spacecraft encountered unexpected problems and disruptions, including a seven-month period in 2020 when Voyager 2 was unable to communicate with Earth. In August, the mission team used the long-shot “shout” technique to restore communications with Voyager 2 after a command accidentally directed the spacecraft’s antenna in the wrong direction.
Cofield said the team hopes to restore the steady flow of data sent by Voyager 1, but the real value of the mission lies in the long run. For example, scientists want to see how particles and magnetic fields change as probes move away from the heliosphere. However, this data set will be incomplete if Voyager 1 cannot send information as it continues.
The mission team has been creative in recent years with strategies to expand the power supply of both spacecraft to enable their record-breaking missions to continue.
“The Voyagers are performing far beyond their primary mission and longer than any other spacecraft in history,” Cofield said. “So while the engineering team is working hard to keep them alive, we also expect problems to arise.”
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