NASA’s Voyager 1 probe, launched in 1977 to survey the outer solar system and is still ticking long after it drifted away from Saturn all the way back in friggin 1980, will be one light-day away from Earth in November 2026 if it doesn’t collide with an asteroid or something, CNN reports.
To put in perspective how much of a pain in the ass it is to continue to monitor and make any software/hardware tweaks to a spacecraft that old and far away, NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory Voyager project manager Suzy Dodd says “If I send a command at 8 am on a Monday morning, I’m going to get Voyager 1’s response back to me on Wednesday morning at approximately 8 am.”
Dodd thinks Voyagers 1 and/or 2 can make it a few years past their 50th anniversary in 2027.