NASA Received Confirmation That The Voyager 2 Space Probe Is “Alive” 

The Voyager 2 probe has been in space for over 45 years. Now it is at a distance of 19.9 billion km from the Earth and is already outside the solar system. It’s already on edge. The probe’s team is using the latest redundant power supplies to extend the life of the spacecraft’s science instruments. Voyager 2 is expected to transmit data until 2026. But the other day NASA reported a problem. During a regular communication session, an erroneous command was “unintentionally” sent to the probe, which turned its communication antenna 2 degrees away from the Earth.

Changing the orientation of the antenna did not interrupt the flow of data to and from the probe, but now they do not intersect. More precisely, they do not reach their destinations. Commands from Earth do not reach the probe, and telemetry and scientific data from the probe are not picked up by NASA’s long-range communications antennas. In such a case, an automatic reset of the antenna orientation settings is provided. Such a reset will occur on October 15, which, as NASA hopes, will return communication with the device. Since there is still a long time until that day, the mission management team has requested assistance from anyone who can provide it. So, ground and space networks began to look for communication with the probe, which responded to the request of the agency.

While scanning the sky, experts detected a signal from the device. This week, they will try to give him instructions to restore orientation using the complex in Australia. If this fails, then scientists will have to wait for October – then the probe will independently restore orientation in space and get in touch with the Earth.