NASA’s iconic area probe is having bother speaking with its residence planet as a consequence of a pc glitch, forcing engineers to resort to decades-old manuals to provide you with a option to repair the 46-year-old mission.
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Launched in 1977, Voyager 1 is now greater than 15 billion miles (24 billion kilometers) away from Earth. The spacecraft has been exploring the outer areas of the photo voltaic system, however it’s just lately unable to ship again any science or engineering knowledge as a consequence of a problem with considered one of its three onboard computer systems, NASA mentioned on Tuesday.
The spacecraft’s flight knowledge system (FDS) collects knowledge from Voyager’s science devices, in addition to engineering knowledge concerning the well being of the spacecraft. That knowledge is mixed right into a single bundle so it may be transmitted to Earth by means of one of many probe’s subsystems, the telemetry modulation unit (TMU), in binary code.
FDS and TMU, nonetheless, have been having bother speaking with one another. Consequently, TMU started sending knowledge to mission management in a repeating sample of ones and zeroes, as if it have been caught. The group behind the mission believes a problem with FDS is the supply of the communication breakdown.
“This previous weekend the group tried to restart the FDS and return it to the state it was in earlier than the difficulty started, however the spacecraft nonetheless isn’t returning useable knowledge,” NASA wrote in an announcement.
Voyager 1 and its sister ship Voyager 2 have been energetic longer than another spacecraft in historical past. A formidable feat, however one which comes with distinctive challenges. As a way to provide you with an answer for the area probe, NASA engineers are trying by means of unique paperwork that have been written a long time in the past. “Consequently, it takes time for the group to know how a brand new command will have an effect on the spacecraft’s operations in an effort to keep away from unintended penalties,” the area company wrote.
The spacecraft is so far-off that it takes 22.5 hours for instructions from Earth to succeed in Voyager 1 and vice versa. Meaning the mission group has to attend 45 hours to seek out out whether or not the command they despatched out was efficient.
This isn’t the primary time Voyager 1 stopped making sense. Final yr, the area probe started transmitting garbled telemetry knowledge that didn’t match up with its precise location and orientation. On the time, NASA engineers discovered that the difficulty was a results of a defective laptop that was corrupting the information.
Regardless of some minor hiccups, Voyager 1 remains to be doing fairly nicely for an ageing spacecraft and NASA’s longest-operating mission. Voyager 1 crossed into interstellar area in August 2012 to review the outer photo voltaic system and discover past the Solar’s heliosphere, and has traveled farther from Earth than another spacecraft.
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