Voyager 1 To Become First Human-Made Object To Reach One Light-Day On Nov 18

Voyager 1 is precariously close to scripting history by becoming the first human-made object to reach one light-day from Earth next week. Launched in 1977, NASA's deep space probe will reach the milestone on Wednesday, November 18, after nearly 50 years of continuous travel through the virgin interstellar space. With Voyager 1 at a distance of one light-day, a signal sent from Earth will take a full day just to reach the probe, highlighting the gargantuan scale of the universe. One light-day is equivalent to 26 billion kilometres.

Voyager 1 has been travelling along the cosmos at a steady pace of 37,763 mph, a speed it achieved in 1980 after a gravity-assisted Saturn flyby. It has been cruising at that speed ever since. The milestone comes 28 years after Voyager 1 passed Pioneer 10 to become the human-made object that has travelled the farthest into space.

On the eve of the landmark day, NASA will be inviting people from across the world to participate in "shine Bright for Voyager's Light-Day" by creating a symbolic wave of golden light encircling the planet after sunset. The space agency has created a website that enables smartphones and tablets to flash “VGR”, Voyager's call sign, in Morse code.

Morse code is made of dots and dashes. When using light to show Morse code, dots are represented by quick flashes, less than a second each. Dashes are represented by longer flashes of light, about one second long.

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Voyager 1's Journey

Voyager 1 was initially designed to last only four years, but it continued drifting into space after the completion of its primary mission. In the process, it became the first human-made probe to cross the heliosphere, the boundary where the influences from outside our solar system are stronger than those from the Sun.

Interestingly, Voyager 1 was launched after Voyager 2, but because of a faster route, it exited the asteroid belt earlier than its twin, and it overtook Voyager 2 on December 15, 1977.

Voyager 1 has two radio transmitters, but has been using only one for years, called an 'X-band'. However, the other transmitter - the 'S-band' - uses a different frequency which has not been employed since 1981. The probe sends back data at a very low 160 bits per second, or a data rate similar to dial-up internet.

At its current rate of usage and decay, Voyager 1 is expected to shut down its final science instruments somewhere in the 2030s and will eventually lose communication with Earth in 2036 due to insufficient power to send a radio signal.