Contact has been made with the lost Voyager 2 probe months earlier than expected (Picture: Nasa)
Nasa’s flight controllers will likely be celebrating tonight, after correcting a mistake that had led to weeks of silence from Voyager 2.
Launched on August 20, 1977, the space probe is currently 12.3 billion miles from Earth, roaming interstellar space and reporting back on its finds.
But there was a slight hiccup in its journey when Voyager 2 stopped communicating two weeks ago.
Controllers sent the wrong command to the 46-year-old spacecraft and tilted its antenna away from Earth.
On Wednesday, NASA’s Deep Space Network sent a new command in hopes of repointing the antenna, using the highest powered transmitter at the huge radio dish antenna in Australia.
Voyager 2’s antenna needed to be shifted a mere 2%.
It took more than 18 hours for the command to reach Voyager 2 — more than 12 billion miles (19 billion kilometers) away — and another 18 hours to hear back.
The long shot paid off.
Voyager 2 and its twin Voyager 1 are the only spacecraft ever to operate outside the heliosphere (Picture: Getty)
On Friday, the spacecraft started returning data again, according to officials at California’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Voyager 2 has been hurtling through space since its launch in 1977 to explore the outer solar system.
Launched two weeks later, its twin, Voyager 1, is now the most distant spacecraft — 15 billion miles (24 billion kilometers) away — and still in contact.
This is not the first time Voyager 2 has encountered comms trouble on its lengthy mission.
In April 1978 the spacecraft’s primary radio receiver failed, and it has been operating on its backup ever since.
On November 5, 2018, Voyager 2 officially left the solar system, crossing the threshold into interstellar space.
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Contact has been made with the lost Voyager 2 probe months earlier than expected.