After a temporary communication breakdown last month, NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft has resumed normal operations.
The team successfully reactivated its primary radio transmitter and resumed data collection from its four active science instruments, despite ongoing power management challenges due to the spacecraft’s advanced age and limited power supply.
The spacecraft unexpectedly switched off its primary X-band radio transmitter and activated the weaker S-band transmitter. Because Voyager 1 is about 15.4 billion miles (24.9 billion kilometers) from Earth, this change made it impossible for the mission team to receive scientific data or updates on the spacecraft’s engineering status.
Earlier this month, engineers successfully reactivated the X-band transmitter and resumed collecting data from Voyager 1’s four operational science instruments during the week of November 18. The team is now finalizing a few tasks to fully restore the probe to its previous operational state, including resetting the system that synchronizes its three onboard computers.
The X-band transmitter had been shut off by the spacecraft’s fault protection system when engineers activated a heater on the spacecraft. Historically, if the fault protection system sensed that the probe had too little power available, it would automatically turn off systems not essential for keeping the spacecraft flying in order to keep power flowing to the critical systems. But the probes have already turned off all nonessential systems except for the science instruments. So the fault protection system turned off the X-band transmitter and turned on the S-band transmitter, which uses less power.
The team successfully reactivated its primary radio transmitter and resumed data collection from its four active science instruments, despite ongoing power management challenges due to the spacecraft’s advanced age and limited power supply.
The spacecraft unexpectedly switched off its primary X-band radio transmitter and activated the weaker S-band transmitter. Because Voyager 1 is about 15.4 billion miles (24.9 billion kilometers) from Earth, this change made it impossible for the mission team to receive scientific data or updates on the spacecraft’s engineering status.
Earlier this month, engineers successfully reactivated the X-band transmitter and resumed collecting data from Voyager 1’s four operational science instruments during the week of November 18. The team is now finalizing a few tasks to fully restore the probe to its previous operational state, including resetting the system that synchronizes its three onboard computers.
The X-band transmitter had been shut off by the spacecraft’s fault protection system when engineers activated a heater on the spacecraft. Historically, if the fault protection system sensed that the probe had too little power available, it would automatically turn off systems not essential for keeping the spacecraft flying in order to keep power flowing to the critical systems. But the probes have already turned off all nonessential systems except for the science instruments. So the fault protection system turned off the X-band transmitter and turned on the S-band transmitter, which uses less power.
