🛰 Voyager 1 & 2
The longest-running space explorers — carrying messages from Earth into the unknown.
Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech – Voyager spacecraft illustration.
Mission Summary
Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 were launched in 1977 to take advantage of a rare planetary alignment. They conducted flybys of the outer planets and then continued outward, becoming the first human-made objects to enter interstellar space.
Each spacecraft carries a Golden Record — a time capsule of sounds, music, and images from Earth.
Mission Objectives
- Study Jupiter and Saturn up close.
- Voyager 2: Continue onward to Uranus and Neptune.
- Measure magnetic fields, atmospheres, and moons of the giant planets.
- After planetary flybys: study the outer heliosphere and interstellar space.
Spacecraft Design
- Power: Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators (RTGs)
- Main Antenna: 3.7-meter high-gain dish
- Instruments: cameras (no longer active), magnetometer, plasma detectors, cosmic ray sensors, etc.
Timeline Highlights
- 1977: Voyager 2 (Aug 20) and Voyager 1 (Sep 5) launches.
- 1979: Jupiter flybys with stunning images of its storms and moons.
- 1980–1981: Saturn flybys; discovery of complex ring structures.
- 1986: Voyager 2 flyby of Uranus.
- 1989: Voyager 2 flyby of Neptune.
- 2012: Voyager 1 crosses into interstellar space.
Key Discoveries
- Active volcanoes on Jupiter’s moon Io.
- Detailed structure of Saturn’s rings.
- New moons around the outer planets.
- Direct measurements of the boundary of the heliosphere.
Voyager fundamentally reshaped our understanding of the outer planets and the true size of the Sun’s influence in space.
Watch the Journey
📺 Voyager mission overview
🎬 Voyager & the Golden Record
Fun Facts
- Voyager 1 is the farthest human-made object from Earth.
- The Golden Record includes greetings in 55 languages, Earth sounds, and music.
- Voyager still communicates using the Deep Space Network, with signals taking hours to reach us.