NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft, which has been traveling through space for over 46 years, has resumed sending back valuable data after six months of sending garbled patterns of zeroes and ones. Despite its incredible journey, which has seen it cross the heliopause and enter interstellar space, the spacecraft operates with just 69.63 kilobytes of memory and runs on code written in the archaic computer language Fortran 5.
Despite its limited computing power compared to everyday technology, such as a button used to open a car door likely having more computing power than Voyager 1, the mission has persevered through challenges like navigating a high-radiation environment. Last year, an issue caused by corrupted memory in one of its computers interrupted normal operations and sent a signal back to Earth containing no useful data. NASA sent commands to the spacecraft on May 17 with a 22.5-hour delay each way for signals to travel between Earth and the spacecraft. Fortunately, the fix appears to have worked and several systems are now operational once more.
Two systems that are now returning usable science data are the plasma wave subsystem and magnetometer instrument. Scientists are working hard to restore Voyager 1 to normal operations, including work on the cosmic ray subsystem and low energy charged particle instrument. As they do so, there is hope that Voyager 1 will continue to send valuable data back to Earth before its power supply ultimately runs out. Project manager Suzanne Dodd emphasized that while there are still many challenges ahead for the mission, it is remarkable that it has lasted this long and continues to provide scientists with invaluable insights into our Solar System and beyond.
