Americas

Home page

Americas

Nasa loses contact with record-breaking probe after sending wrong command

01 August 2023 16:23 (UTC +04:00)

Nasa has lost contact with its Voyager 2 probe billions of miles away from Earth after mistakenly severing contact with it, the space agency has revealed, APA reports citing BBC News.

Last month, the spacecraft - exploring space since 1977 - was sent the wrong command, tilting its antenna to point two degrees away from Earth. As a result, the probe has stopped receiving commands or sending data. Nasa said it hopes communication will resume when the probe is due to reset in October.

Voyager 2 is more than 12.3 billion miles (19.9 billion km) from Earth, where it is hurtling at an estimated 34,390mph (55,346km/h) through interstellar space - the space between the stars.

Since 21 July, the pioneering probe has been unable to receive commands or send back data to Nasa's Deep Space Network - an array of giant radio antennae across the world - and the spacecraft is not receiving commands from ground controllers.

However, there is hope for the probe, nearly 46 years into its mission.

The antenna will also bombard Voyager 2's area with the correct command, in the hope it makes contact with the probe, said Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which manages the Voyager missions.

Otherwise, Voyager 2 is programmed to reset its orientation multiple times each year to keep its antenna pointing at Earth. The next reset is due on 15 October, which Nasa says "should enable communication to resume".