[SamAdams76]

Hopefully we can send somebody out there to find out just what the heck happened.

[Jhoffa_]

Wow..

This is so captivating.. It's romantic in a way.

It's mind blowing to think of voyager as traveling across space for millions of years.. gliding by all the cold and uninhabited worlds out there.

[joey'smom]

Darn! With all the things we really need to fall silent, why this?

[billorites]

"Pioneer 10....has fallen silent after traveling billions of miles from Earth on a mission that has lasted nearly 31 years."

If you returned it to L.L. Bean's, they'd probably replace it for free.

[MrsEmmaPeel]

The data rate of the old Pioneer spacecraft is something like 1 byte/second. I was at JPL (test engineer) when the big upgrade to the data rate in the gigabytes/second range came with Magellan. Back then ground stations could track Pioneer with a signal as weak as one-billionth of a watt. Back then everyone was saying Pioneer was dead, and what was the point of tracking it.... "Job security" others would answer.

[Bogey78O]

Captain Klaa will find it soon enough.....

[Texas_Jarhead]

that was a long run... I agree, we got our money's worth

[#3Fan]

It's getting pretty close to Nibiru now. Nibiru's electromagnetics must've fried it. :^)

[Senator Pardek]

Pioneer 10 spacecraft falls silent after nearly 31 years

It's not silent - we just can't hear it...

[snopercod]

By God, the engineers who designed the Pioneer spacecraft were giants. Will somebody please post the image of the plaque it carried?

[strela]

Don't worry, we'll get it back in a few years. Inside a big honkin' blue cloud that shoots lightning bolts and threatens to turn the Earth into data patterns.

[ken in texas]

. . . after nearly 31 years . . .

This is just freaking amazing. For all of the stuff we still don't seem to get working right... with our throwaway society that wears out a VCR in 2 years - that this spacecraft is still functioning boggles my mind. It is also a tribute to the talented engineers on the design team.

[DeuceTraveler]

I love reading this stuff. Too bad our space program seems to lack vision of late.

[concentric circles]

I wonder if we'll find a way to get back in touch one day?
And don't you hate throwing away an old cell phone?

[bmwcyle]

NASA just can't anything working, just kidding. Goodbye old friend.

[Bob J]

NOW on RadioFR! Brent Bozell (Media Research Center), Scott Hogenson (CNSNews.com), Bill Federer (author and ex US Congressman), Tygh Bailes (Leadership Institute)and Gary Nowlan (Libertarian Party Prez Candidate)!

Click HERE to listen LIVE while you FReep! HIFI broadband feed HERE! (when available)

Would you like to receive a note when RadioFR is on the air? Click HERE!

Click HERE to chat in the RadioFR chat room!

Miss a show?

Click HERE for RadioFR Archives!

[jackbill]

It will take 2 million years to reach it.

Damn, but I think that I'll probably miss it.

[Junior]

Rest peacefully...

[tubebender]

It's not my fault...

[JZoback]

At the time, Pioneer 10 was 7.6 billion miles from Earth; the signal, traveling at the speed of light, took 11 hours and 20 minutes to arrive.

Not to be real picky, but how does a signal travel the speed of light.

Is this a typo or is the signal sent on a light beam? If it was, I never heard of that before