NASA hears signal from Voyager 2 spacecraft after mistakenly cutting contact

After days of silence, NASA has heard from Voyager 2 in interstellar space billions of miles away.

Flight controllers by chance despatched a fallacious command practically two weeks in the past that tilted the spacecraft’s antenna away from Earth and severed contact.

NASA’s Deep Space Network, big radio antennas throughout the globe, picked up a “heartbeat sign,” which means the 46-year-old craft is alive and working, challenge supervisor Suzanne Dodd mentioned in an electronic mail Tuesday.

The information “buoyed our spirits,” Dodd mentioned. Flight controllers on the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California will now attempt to flip Voyager 2’s antenna again towards Earth.

If the command would not work—and controllers doubt it can—they’re going to have to attend till October for an automated spacecraft reset. The antenna is just 2% off-kilter.

“That’s a very long time to attend, so we’ll attempt sending up instructions a number of occasions” earlier than then, Dodd mentioned.

Voyager 2 rocketed into space in 1977, together with its similar twin Voyager 1, on a quest to discover the outer planets.

Nonetheless speaking and dealing tremendous, Voyager 1 is now 15 billion miles (24 billion kilometers) from Earth, making it essentially the most distant spacecraft.

Voyager 2 trails its twin in interstellar space at greater than 12 billion miles (19 billion kilometers) from Earth. At that distance, it takes greater than 18 hours for a sign to journey a method.

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