Voyager I reaches border of sun system

[maxim]

Sorry, I've found this article only in german:
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/59924

It tells that Voyager I has reached (in 14 billion km distance from the sun, and after 28 years of travel) the border of our solar system, and detected the so called 'Termination Shock', an area where the solar wind meets the interstellar plasma and thus receives a sudden deceleration, leading to a distinct amplification of the solar magnetic field.

If you're interested in the actual mission status reports, have a look here:
http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/weekly-reports/index.htm

maxim

[Planet X]

Here's the official press release:

Voyager Spacecraft Enters Solar System's Final Frontier
05.24.05
(Source: Jet Propulsion Laboratory)

Dolores Beasley
Headquarters, Washington May 24, 2005
(Phone: 202/358-1753)

Bill Steigerwald
Goddard Space Flight Center,
Greenbelt, Md. (Phone: 301/286-5017)

Jane Platt Jet Propulsion Laboratory,
Pasadena, Calif. (Phone: 818/354-0880)

RELEASE: 05-131

VOYAGER SPACECRAFT ENTERS SOLAR SYSTEM'S FINAL FRONTIER

NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft has entered the solar system's final frontier. It is entering a vast, turbulent expanse, where the sun's influence ends and the solar wind crashes into the thin gas between stars.

"Voyager 1 has entered the final lap on its race to the edge of interstellar space," said Dr. Edward Stone, Voyager project scientist at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Caltech manages NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, which built and operates Voyager 1 and its twin, Voyager 2.

In November 2003, the Voyager team announced it was seeing events unlike any in the mission's then 26-year history. The team believed the unusual events indicated Voyager 1 was approaching a strange region of space, likely the beginning of this new frontier called the termination shock region. There was considerable controversy over whether Voyager 1 had indeed encountered the termination shock or was just getting close.

The termination shock is where the solar wind, a thin stream of electrically charged gas blowing continuously outward from the sun, is slowed by pressure from gas between the stars. At the termination shock, the solar wind slows abruptly from a speed that ranges from 700,000 to 1.5 million mph and becomes denser and hotter. The consensus of the team is Voyager 1, at approximately 8.7 billion miles from the sun, has at last entered the heliosheath, the region beyond the termination shock.

Predicting the location of the termination shock was hard, because the precise conditions in interstellar space are unknown. Also, changes in the speed and pressure of the solar wind cause the termination shock to expand, contract and ripple.

The most persuasive evidence that Voyager 1 crossed the termination shock is its measurement of a sudden increase in the strength of the magnetic field carried by the solar wind, combined with an inferred decrease in its speed. This happens whenever the solar wind slows down.

In December 2004, the Voyager 1 dual magnetometers observed the magnetic field strength suddenly increasing by a factor of approximately 2 1/2, as expected when the solar wind slows down. The magnetic field has remained at these high levels since December. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., built the magnetometers.

Voyager 1 also observed an increase in the number of high-speed electrically charged electrons and ions and a burst of plasma wave noise before the shock. This would be expected if Voyager 1 passed the termination shock. The shock naturally accelerates electrically charged particles that bounce back and forth between the fast and slow winds on opposite sides of the shock, and these particles can generate plasma waves.

"Voyager's observations over the past few years show the termination shock is far more complicated than anyone thought," said Dr. Eric Christian, Discipline Scientist for the Sun-Solar System Connection research program at NASA Headquarters, Washington.

The result is being presented today at a press conference in the Morial Convention Center, New Orleans, during the 2005 Joint Assembly meeting of Earth and space science organizations.

For more information about Voyager visit:
[link]www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/solarsystem/voyager_agu.html[/link]
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Note: Pioneer 10 is most likely past the termination shock as well, but alas, we can no longer communicate with it due to the incredible distance and it's diminished power source. Later!

J P

[PlutonianEmpire]

At that distance, would we still be able to see the sunlight reflecting off of surfaces?

[julesstoop]

The sun's visible magnitude is about -17 out there. That's a whole of a lot brighter than a full moon. I guess it's more like one of these standard 20 Watt low voltage halogens from something like 2 meters away.

[PlutonianEmpire]

So, voyager may be able to tell if it were on collision course with a rogue planet at that distance?

[Le Chacal]

I'm not sure NASA is using anymore cameras of Voyager, and a collision with a "hidden" planet of our system might be as probable as an astero??d fall just into your living room no ?

[PlutonianEmpire]

I'm not sure NASA is using anymore cameras of Voyager, and a collision with a "hidden" planet of our system might be as probable as an astero??d fall just into your living room no ?

That's true.

[TourqeGlare]

I think we all know the fate of the probe...





(Im done spamming)

[PlutonianEmpire]

I think we all know the fate of the probe...





(Im done spamming)

Umm, the pic is not working.

[tony873004]

It may be past the termination shock, but it's far from "out of the solar system". Sedna must be getting a good laugh at the headlines.

[GoHeelsWeeeehoooo]

i think voyager has passed pioneer as far as distance goes...pioneer seems like the forgotten probe...you never hear about it much anymore

[julesstoop]

There's not much to hear any longer.

[d.m.falk]

There's not much to hear any longer.

I wouldn't exactly say that....

http://www-pw.physics.uiowa.edu/space-audio/vgr-helio.html
http://www-pw.physics.uiowa.edu/space-audio/voyager/termination-shock/

d.m.f.

[julesstoop]

Ah! Nice links.
I was refering to pioneer though, which is dead a.f.a.i.k.

[d.m.falk]

Ah! Nice links.
I was refering to pioneer though, which is dead a.f.a.i.k.

Pioneer 10 fell silent in 2003.

http://spaceprojects.arc.nasa.gov/Space_Projects/pioneer/PNhome.html
d.m.f.

[GoHeelsWeeeehoooo]

i know that the pioneer 10 probe has gone silent...i meant that we don't hear much about pioneer as in when we think of deep space probes voyager is usually the first that comes to mind

i do think that pioneer and voyager are 2 of the greatest acheivements in the 20th century

[d.m.falk]

i know that the pioneer 10 probe has gone silent...i meant that we don't hear much about pioneer as in when we think of deep space probes voyager is usually the first that comes to mind

This could be attributed to the fact that Voyager 1 surpassed Pioneer 10 as the most distant spacecraft in 1997. Pioneer 6, however, is the oldest spacecraft still in operation (see the Pioneer site's link I previously posted).

i do think that pioneer and voyager are 2 of the greatest acheivements in the 20th century

The Pioneer space program is the longest and most far-reaching of any interplanetary probe program ever launched, ranging from Venus to the Sun to Jupiter & Saturn, and not to mention aiding in the study of the heliopause, along with the two Voyager probes.

The Voyager probes have perhaps the most scientific data extant, covering far more than just data from four planets and their moons, but have also aided in our understanding of solar windstorms, and so forth.

Next up, I would say the single best planetary probe ever has to be the Mars Global Surveyor, which has given us far more data on Mars than we've gotten from any other planet, including our own moon, aside from Earth itself.

The triumverate of space telescopes, Hubble, Chandra and Spitzer, have greatly advanced our knowledge of the universe in ways never imagined.

I think our efforts to explore space have greatly improved our understanding of the world- and universe- that we live in.

I don't care which nation gets out there, as long as all nations have a chance to get out there- And it's wrong for my country- America- to fall behind on both manned and unmanned exploration.

d.m.f.