After losing all contact with its Voyager 2 interstellar probe following a handling error, NASA announces that it has managed to reestablish the connection. This is good news, while some thought Voyager 2 was lost for months.
Voyager 2 is back! Located more than 19.9 billion kilometers from Earth, the legendary probe scared NASA, after disappearing from radar on 1er august. The worst was that the American space agency was at the origin of this loss of contact, after having sent an erroneous command towards the mission. This error had unintentionally pointed the antenna 2 degrees from the Earthe”, which interrupted all telecommunications. And as an instruction takes 18 hours to reach Voyager 2, everything suggested that the signal might be blocked for a long time.
In an update to its press release published on August 4, NASA announces the good news: “The Agency’s Deep Space Network facilities in Canberra, Australia, sent the equivalent of an interstellar ‘shout’ over 19.9 billion miles away from Voyager 2, instructing it to reorient itself and turn its antenna towards the Earth. With a one-way light time of 18.5 hours for the command to reach Voyager, it took mission controllers 37 hours to find out if the command had worked. At 12:29 p.m. (EDT) on August 4, the probe began returning science and telemetry data, indicating that it was operating normally and remaining on its planned path.
hours of suspense
This announcement follows the detection of a signal from Voyager 2, captured a few hours after the loss of the probe. After suggesting that Voyager 2 could be lost until October 15, the date of its next orientation reset, Nasa was quick to suggest that there was hope of contacting the probe. Since the Deep Space Network, the telecommunications network with deep space, had picked up a signal, NASA hoped to be able to order Voyager 2 to return to the correct position.
After several hours of waiting (and stress), NASA’s theory turned out to be correct. Voyager 2 has moved back into the Earth’s axis and is once again communicating with scientists. The probe, launched in 1977, will be able to continue to explore the immensity of the universe.
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