Artist’s representation of one of the vital Voyager spacecraft. Credit score: Caltech/NASA-JPLNASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft has begun transmitting usable engineering knowledge for the primary time since November after a chip failure in considered one of its onboard computer systems halted knowledge transmission.For the primary time since November 2023, NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft is returning usable knowledge concerning the well being and standing of its onboard engineering programs. The next move is to permit the spacecraft to start returning science knowledge once more. The probe and its dual, Voyager 2, are the one spacecraft to ever fly in interstellar house (the distance between stars).Voyager 1 stopped sending readable science and engineering knowledge again to Earth on November 14, 2023, although project controllers may inform the spacecraft used to be nonetheless receiving their instructions and in a different way working usually. In March, the Voyager engineering workforce at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California showed that the problem used to be tied to one of the vital spacecraft’s 3 onboard computer systems, known as the flight knowledge subsystem (FDS). The FDS is liable for packaging the science and engineering knowledge sooner than it’s despatched to Earth.Way to the Reminiscence IssueThe workforce came upon {that a} unmarried chip liable for storing a portion of the FDS reminiscence — together with one of the vital FDS pc’s instrument code — isn’t operating. The lack of that code rendered the science and engineering knowledge unusable. Not able to fix the chip, the workforce made up our minds to put the affected code in different places within the FDS reminiscence. However no unmarried location is huge sufficient to carry the segment of code in its entirety.
After receiving knowledge concerning the well being and standing of Voyager 1 for the primary time in 5 months, individuals of the Voyager flight workforce rejoice in a convention room at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory on April 20. Credit score: NASA/JPL-CaltechImplementing the FixSo they devised a plan to divide the affected code into sections and retailer the ones sections elsewhere within the FDS. To make this plan paintings, in addition they had to modify the ones code sections to make sure, for instance, that all of them nonetheless serve as as a complete. Any references to the site of that code in different portions of the FDS reminiscence had to be up to date as neatly.The workforce began by way of singling out the code liable for packaging the spacecraft’s engineering knowledge. They despatched it to its new location within the FDS reminiscence on April 18. A radio sign takes about 22 ½ hours to succeed in Voyager 1, which is over 15 billion miles (24 billion kilometers) from Earth, and any other 22 ½ hours for a sign to come back again to Earth. When the project flight workforce heard again from the spacecraft on April 20, they noticed that the amendment labored: For the primary time in 5 months, they have been ready to test the well being and standing of the spacecraft.Long run Plans and Voyager 2 StatusDuring the approaching weeks, the workforce will relocate and modify the opposite affected parts of the FDS instrument. Those come with the parts that may get started returning science knowledge.Voyager 2 continues to function usually. Introduced over 46 years in the past, the dual Voyager spacecraft are the longest-running and maximum far-off spacecraft in historical past. Sooner than the beginning in their interstellar exploration, each probes flew by way of Saturn and Jupiter, and Voyager 2 flew by way of Uranus and Neptune.Caltech in Pasadena, California, manages JPL for NASA.
