Voyager I and II are leaving our Solar system

In august and September 1977 NASA launched the satellites Voyager I and II. I am always curious about them because they are launched just before and after my birthday. They are human made objects with the greatest distance to Earth ever. But where is that? Voyager I is at the unbelievable distance of 18,42 billion kilometers (that is 18,42 terameters for real nerds). Voyager II is only 15 terameters away from Earth.

A schematic to show the flight paths of Voyager I and II. Voyager II left
Earth two weeks earlier, but Voyager I took the lead very soon. Both
satellites are now about the leave the heliosphere, the zone of solar
influence.

Those distances are huge, but not yet as great as light-years  The time it takes before a radio message from Voyager I to received on Earth is more than 17 hours. A message like that travels with the speed of light. You could say, Voyager I is at a distance of 17 light-hours at the moment. A light-years is 515 times further than the distance between the satellite and Earth.

A picture of the Voyager satellite. In the metal tube at the
bottom is the atomic generator. The big dish is needed to
communicate with earth. The very long antenna is used to
measure the weak magnetic effects of the solar wind.

Sometime in the next 10 to 15 years Voyager I will finally leave the solar system. Probably it will run out of energy before that time. Or the distance towards the Earth is getting too problematic. Hopefully they will be still alive to witness this special moment. In any case these two satellites will once become the furthest pieces of garbage we even sent into space.

Golden sign on the Voyager satellites with information for
alien species. It says who we are and where they can find
us. I will write another blog once about what all these
figures mean.

More information:
- Live information on the distance between Voyager I and II and Earth: Voyager.jpl.nasa.gov
- The latest measurements of Voyager I made scientists doubt about the size of the heliosphere. Maybe Voyager I will be busy for another decade before it has really left the solar system: Voyager 1: 'reports of my exit are greatly exaggerated'

De Nederlandse versie van deze blog bijdrage: Voyager I en II verlaten bijna het zonnestelsel