The problem was caused by a broken chip in one of the spacecraft's computers.
After more than five months without contact, NASA has finally reconnected with Voyager 1, the furthest spacecraft from Earth.
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) says Voyager 1 has not transmitted readable data to Earth since November 14, 2023, even though it is still receiving mission controller commands. He said no.
In December 2023, JPL announced that the problem was with one of Voyager 1's onboard computers, called the Flight Data Subsystem (FDS). NASA said technicians tried restarting the computer, but the problem persisted.
However, JPL announced this week that Voyager 1 has resumed sending technology updates to Earth.
NASA announced that engineers identified the problem earlier this month. The chip that stores part of the computer's memory was damaged, making the data unreadable. The team was unable to repair the chip and determined the affected code needed to be stored elsewhere in FDS memory, but no single location was large enough to do so, JPL said Monday. said in a release.
The team “planned to split the affected code into sections and store those sections in different locations within FDS,” the release states. “To make this plan work, we also had to adjust these code sections to make sure, for example, that everything still worked as a whole.”
The code packaging Voyager 1's engineering data was first transmitted to its new location on April 18. JPL said it would take 22.5 hours for the radio signal to reach Voyager 1, and another 22.5 hours for the signal to return to Earth. JPL said the team was confident the fix was successful when it heard from Voyager 1 on April 20.
“Hello, it's me. – V1”, Voyager 1's X account Posted Monday afternoon.
In the coming weeks, more parts of the FDS software will be redeployed and the team will work to get the spacecraft back to transmitting science data, JPL said.
Voyager 1 was launched in September 1977 under the Voyager program to study the distant planets of our solar system and interstellar space. Voyager 1 entered interstellar space in her 2012, becoming the first man-made object to leave the solar system.
Meanwhile, JPL said its twin spacecraft, Voyager 2, continues to operate “as usual.” It reached interstellar space in 2018 and is the second farthest spacecraft from Earth.