The news “buoyed our spirits,” Dodd said. Flight controllers at the JPL will now try to turn Voyager 2’s antenna back toward Earth.
“A bit like hearing the spacecraft’s ‘heartbeat,’ it confirms the spacecraft is still broadcasting, which engineers expected,” officials at JPL posted in a tweet on August 1. “Engineers will now try to send Voyager 2 a command to point itself back at Earth.”
Earth to Voyager… 📡
The Deep Space Network has picked up a carrier signal from @NASAVoyager 2 during its regular scan of the sky. A bit like hearing the spacecraft's “heartbeat," it confirms the spacecraft is still broadcasting, which engineers expected. https://t.co/tPcCyjMjJY— NASA JPL (@NASAJPL) August 1, 2023
The command may not adjust the antenna. Then, engineers will need to wait until October for an automatic spacecraft reset.
“That is a long time to wait, so we’ll try sending up commands several times” before then, Dodd said.
Voyager 2 was launched into space in 1977, along with its identical twin rocket Voyager 1. Their mission was to explore the outer planets.
Still communicating without a glitch and working fine, Voyager 1 is now 15 billion miles (24 billion kilometers) from Earth. It is the most distant spacecraft sent by humans.
Voyager 2 trails its twin. Its location is 12 billion miles (19 billion kilometers) from Earth. And it takes more than 18 hours for signals to travel one way.
