Car-sized Voyager 1 keeps moving outward past Pluto, outlasting its builders
TL;DR Summary
Launched in 1977, Voyager 1—roughly the size of a small car—still sails outward at about 17 km/s, now well beyond Pluto’s orbit at 166 AU. It communicates at light speed, with signals taking over 23 hours to reach Earth, while its power has dwindled to ~250 watts and only two instruments remain active. The mission has outlived its original four-year plan, outlasting most of its creators, and it carries the Golden Record as a lasting message as it drifts through interstellar space for billions of years.
- A spacecraft no larger than a small car, launched the year Star Wars came out, is still moving outward at 38,000 miles per hour far beyond the orbit of Pluto — and the radio signals it sends home, traveling at the speed of light, now take more than 23 hours to re Space Daily
- Voyager 1 has been travelling non-stop since 1977, faster than a speeding bullet every second of every day, and it has not yet reached the distance of a single light-year from Earth Space Daily
- It's Official: Voyager 1 Will Break A Cosmic Record, Reaching 1 Light-Day From Earth On November 18, 2026 IFLScience
- The 49-Year-Old Spacecraft Still Talking From Deep Space HackerNoon
- NASA Launched It In 1977, Nearly 50 Years Later, It's Still Talking To Earth | Viral News news18.com
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