[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Credit: NASA/JPL

[keithtoo]

There are actual milestones 9.3 Billion miles from the sun? Do they have them every mile?

[shankbear]

Would have loved to have had the govt's .45 cents per mile for that trip. Seriously that is fabulous.

[LdSentinal]

Voyager 1 should be sending back signals at least until 2020.

Still, a million miles per day is not even Warp 2.

[quantim]

Velocity ping.

[raygun]

ping

[HitmanLV]

V'Ger requests the information!!!

[VeniVidiVici]

Voyager 1 is now at the outer edge of our solar system, in an area called the heliosheath, the zone where the sun's influence wanes.

Great. Soon to be entering Klingon space I'm sure.

Does Voyager really travel one million miles per day? Seems a tad on the high side.

[Paleo Conservative]

The Voyagers owe their longevity to their nuclear power sources, called radioisotope thermoelectric generators, provided by the Department of Energy.

No, they were provided by the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC). Voyager 2 was launched August 20, 1977; Voyager 1 was launched September 5, 1977, and the DOE was founded on October 8, 1977.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Thanks for posting. My Dad managed the program at GE to build the RTGs that power the Voyager spacecraft. The project was originally "Mariner Jupiter Saturn." I remember all the incredible tests his team did to make sure the plutonium powered generators could survive a launch crash.

[knarf]

Are we getting pictures or just radio or whatever wave/pings that merely say .. "I'm still here" ??

[KellyAdmirer]

Is that the one with the message from Kurt Waldheim in it?

[One_who_hopes_to_know]

V'Ger must evolve.
Its knowledge has
reached the limits of
this universe and
it must evolve.

[Not now, Not ever!]

Bump, BTTT, RamaLamaDingDong, as a bookmark. And what have the muzzies done lately?

[Thinkin' Gal]

Voyager 1 passes milestone

Yikes. Is that like an oversized kidney stone?

[DadOfTwoMarines]

I wonder who get the frequent flyer miles??

[Virginia-American]

(( ping ))

[william clark]

This prompts me to ask a question that occasionally springs to my mind. I just saw an astronomy presentation, and one image among the photos was of the Milky Way galaxy, with an arrow indicating the Earth's position in it.

The context of this image suggested that it, too, was a photograph. However, how can that possibly be the case if only a couple of manmade objects have even made it outside the bounds of our solar system? Is what I saw merely an artist's conception that wasn't identified as such? I'm sure this will seem like a stupid question to some, but it's just one of those things I've never had the opportunity to ask anyone about. If it is actually a photo, then how was the image captured?

[politicket]

PING...

[Basilides]

Why does NASA forget about Pioneer I and II both of which are further away from earth than any Voyager?

[free_at_jsl.com]

And no mention at all of the freakish acceleration being observed? To me, that's the most exciting part of the whole mission. For some unknown reason, Voyager is speeding up as it gets farther away.