Get Ready, Because Voyager I Is *This Close* to Leaving Our Solar System

The Atlantic ^ | June 13, 2012 | Rebecca J. Rosen

[C19fan]

ast week, in the corners of the Internet devoted to outer space, things started to get a little, well, hot. Voyager 1, the man-made object farthest away from Earth, was encountering a sharp uptick in the number of a certain kind of energetic particles around it. Had the spacecraft become the first human creation to "officially" leave the solar system?

It's hard to overstate how wild an accomplishment this would be: A machine, built here on Earth by the brain- and handiwork of humans, has sailed from Florida, out of Earth's orbit, beyond Mars, beyond the gas giants of Jupiter and Saturn, and may now have left the heliosphere -- tiny dot in the universe beholden to our sun. Had it really happened? How would we know?

[C19fan]

Looking forward to Voyager's return as V'Ger.

[Army Air Corps]

Space Ping.

[cripplecreek]

I say it hasn’t left the solar system till it passes the Ort cloud which it won’t even reach for thousands of years.

[Charles Henrickson]

beyond the gas giants of Jupiter and Saturn. . . .

Beyond the gas giant of Uranus?

[massgopguy]

Here’s hoping it doesn’t come back.

[Roccus]

Ping

[Lazamataz]

I'm looking forward to the bald chick.

[ctdonath2]

Yup, just as the headline says. *this close* = thousands of years.

:-)

[cripplecreek]

I don't think its even reached the outer extent of Pluto's orbit yet.

[Dead Corpse]

Pretty cool. I say we build another ship, even faster, and see if we can catch up to it.

[Doc Savage]

Wolowitz isn’t far behind!

[cripplecreek]

Current location.

[Cowman]

Pretty cool. I say we build another ship, even faster, and see if we can catch up to it.

OK, But only if we paint it orange and put a Confederate battle flag on top and "01" on the sides.

[Jack Hydrazine]

It’ll be interesting to see what happens to Voyager 1 when it leaves the heliopause. Will the interstellar medium/stellar wind have an adverse effect on it?

[cripplecreek]

As of yesterday the New Horizons craft is less than 9 AU from its Pluto flyby. In August the Curiosity rover is due to land on mars.

[fishtank]

This is awful.

It does absolutely nothing to make the Muslim planet feel better about itself.

/sarc
planet = “world”

[762X51]

Looking forward to Voyager's return as V'Ger

Or as V'Giny

[P.O.E.]

The solar system is just an elaborate sound stage the CIA zapped with a shrink ray and stores in a mason jar at Area 51.

[martin_fierro]

Get Ready, Because Voyager I Is *This Close* to Leaving Our Solar System

She's been saying this for years. Drama queen. Talk about an opus!

[Mich Patriot]

"I'm looking forward to the bald chick."

Yeah, but for all you know, she may EAT you (and not in a good way). Also, exactly how bald is she I wonder?

[GraceG]

They have been saying this about these space probes for years!

We need to build a ionpowered space probe that only has a goal of seeing how fast we can get it going. Something like a flying nuclear rocket with a constant ion engine on it. I wanna see humans hit at least 1% the speed of light before I croak.

[Army Air Corps]

Ah yes, Persis Khambatta. Pity that she died in 1998.

[SpinnerWebb]

Or as V'Giny

V'Gina?

[COBOL2Java]

Looking forward to Voyager's return as V'Ger.

Just don't sing...

[Dead Corpse]

“Yeah, its got a hemi...”

[Red Badger]

IF it exists...............

[cripplecreek]

http://www.icarusinterstellar.org/

[cripplecreek]

Personally I think the Ort cloud isn’t a shell around our solar system but is just the standard stuff that exists in interstellar space.

[faucetman]

“V ger”

[Lazamataz]

Ah yes, Persis Khambatta. Pity that she died in 1998.

Worst day of my life.

Hers, too.

[762X51]

No, V’Giny. The FCC V Chip satellite collided with the United States Air Force’s Flying Destiny. It’s from Futurama. They spoofed the Star Trek V’Ger episode. It’s not funny when you have to explain it.

[Conservative4Ever]

You may be right, but I’ll bet it’s over the rainbow. :-)

[BenLurkin]

How do we get that gold record back? We need to melt it down to buy gas.

[Jack Hydrazine]

I’m hoping that once they put a VASIMIR engine on the ISS and test it fully that they will do something like you are proposing.

[Red Badger]

If it exists, the every star should have one similar. We should be able to detect Oort Clouds around most every star we look at. Why should our sun be so unique?

The comets and other junk are leftovers from some far supernovae or other destructive processes out in the universe, like bugs on your windshield on the interstate.......................

[tob2]

My thoughts exactly! lol

[DonkeyBonker]

To quote Maxwell Smart, “Missed it by that much.”.

[Lockbar]

Twenty Five years to leave the sloar system? What a slow-poke. Thought it was already gone years ago.

[STD]

Our generations ‘tower of babel’

[PT57A]

"I got yer pon farr right here little darlin, how about cozyin' up that shiny dome of yours next to old Uncle Spock here for an old fashioned hoochie mama mind meld?"

[canuck_conservative]

The solar system is just an elaborate sound stage the CIA zapped with a shrink ray and stores in a mason jar at Area 51.

And Sheila Jackson Lee stills demands to see the flag that Neil Armstrong planted on Mars.

[njslim]

When will it reach NIBIRU...?

[Retired Greyhound]

They have been saying this about these space probes for years!

I would appreciate if you didn't say "space" and "probes" in the same sentence.

Brings back bad memories. Ouch.

[SES1066]

Twenty Five years to leave the sloar/solar system? What a slow-poke. Thought it was already gone years ago.

The definition of our Solar System has been getting changed in the 33 years of Voyager 1 & 2(1977). Obviously, at the time of their launch, most people and even many scientists would have put the boundary of the Solar System at the outermost planet, Pluto. Voyager 1 passed Pluto's orbit in May 1988 while Voyager 2 in August 1990. So you are correct in that milestone,

Now Pluto, even though it has been discovered to have a moon, has been demoted to a new category of 'dwarf planet' and now the furthest out is the similarly classified Eris. Recently discovered in 2005 at a current 3 times the distance of Pluto from the Sun or aphelion(max distance) of 97.5 AU (Astronomical Units, 1 AU is 93 million miles = Earth's orbit) to perihelion (min distance) of 37.7 AU (inside Pluto's aphelion.)

Voyager 1 is now at better than 120 AU while Voyager 2 is only[!] at 98 AU. So it is accurate only to say that Voyager 1 is well beyond the furthest discovered solid planet-like object (subject to change at any time!)

[mikrofon]

“Missed it by that much.”

[mikrofon]

Captain Decker was devastated, but eventually got together with that Whale Biologist & lived happily ever after....

[folkquest]

“This is space! ‘Course, we’re just in the beginning part of space, we-we haven’t even got to *outer* space yet!”
-Armageddon

[cripplecreek]

Voyager 1 is well beyond the furthest discovered solid planet-like object (subject to change at any time!)

Its still inside the closest orbit of Sedna.

[SES1066]

Its still inside the closest orbit of Sedna.

Au contraire mon ami. According to my info, Sedna (IAU 90377) is approaching its ±11,400 year perihelion of ±76.361 AU before swinging out to its eye-popping aphelion of ±937 AU. Whew, talk about eccentricity!

Since Voyager 1 is at 120+ AU, that puts it beyond that lowly vacation spot of Sedna.

I will say that we taxpayers have really gotten our money's worth out of these probes that are estimated to be able to keep reporting for another 10-13 years (47 years total!)

Happy 237th Birthday to the US Army and Happy Flag Day!

[cripplecreek]

Thank ya, fer the correction.