The Voyager mission team at NASA has been able to detect a signal from Voyager 2 after losing contact with the spacecraft, which has been operating for nearly 46 years.
“We enlisted the help of the (Deep Space Network) and Radio Science groups to help to see if we could hear a signal from Voyager 2,” said Suzanne Dodd, Voyager’s project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
“This was successful in that we see the ‘heartbeat’ signal from the spacecraft. So, we know the spacecraft is alive and operating. This buoyed our spirits.”
Commands sent to Voyager 2 on July 21 accidentally caused the spacecraft’s antenna to point two degrees away from Earth. The miniscule shift means that Voyager 2 can’t receive any commands from mission control or send data back to Earth from its location more than 19.9 billion kilometres in interstellar space.
The mission team was pleasantly surprised to be able to detect the spacecraft’s “carrier signal” using the Deep Space Network, an international array of massive radio antennas that allows NASA to communicate with missions across the cosmos.
Each of the three giant dishes are equidistant, meaning that one is always in communication with different spacecraft as Earth rotates. One radio antenna is located at Goldstone near Barstow, California, the second near Madrid, and the third near Canberra.
Now, the mission team will attempt to send a signal back to the spacecraft.
“We are now generating a new command to attempt to point the spacecraft antenna toward Earth,” Dodd said.
“There is a low probability that this will work.”
‘Shouting’ into the cosmos
The signal, sent via the Deep Space Network, is basically an attempt to “shout” at Voyager 2 and try to get its attention, despite the fact that its antenna isn’t oriented in a way to receive the radio signal, according to NASA.
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Given the distance between Voyager 2 and Earth, it takes about 18.5 hours for the signal to travel one way across the solar system to the spacecraft.
If the Earth-based signals don’t reach Voyager 2, the spacecraft is already programmed to reorient itself multiple times a year to keep its antenna pointing in Earth’s direction. The next reset was already scheduled for October 15, and the team is hopeful that this program will allow communications to resume with Voyager 2.
“But that is a long time to wait, so (we) will try sending up commands several times prior to that date,” Dodd said.
It’s not the first time that the aging twin probes, both launched in 1977, have experienced issues. As these “senior citizens” continue exploring the cosmos, the team has slowly turned off instruments to conserve power and extend their missions.
Along the way, both Voyager 1 and 2 have encountered unexpected issues and dropouts, including a seven-month period where Voyager 2 and the Deep Space Network couldn’t communicate in 2020.
Remarkable shot of closest star-forming region to Earth
The team expects that Voyager 2 will remain on its planned trajectory, even without receiving commands.
Meanwhile, Voyager 1, which is nearly 24 billion kilometres from Earth, continues to operate as expected and communicate with the Deep Space Network.
Both are in interstellar space and the only spacecraft to operate beyond the heliosphere, the sun’s bubble of magnetic fields and particles that extends well beyond the orbit of Pluto, collecting valuable data as they explore uncharted interstellar territory.
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