Voyager 2 is back online after eight months of radio silence
(2020/11/03)
- Reference: 1604379494
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/11/03/voyager_2_back_online/
- Source link:
NASA has successfully communicated with the Voyager 2 probe after an eight-month hiatus.
The long break in conversation was due to maintenance of the only Earthly antenna now capable of sending signals to the probe needed an overhaul.
The antenna in question is named Deep Space Station 43 (DSS43) and is located just outside Canberra, Australia’s capital city. The facility’s 70 metre main dish is forty-eight years old and the only antenna of that size in the southern hemisphere. As Voyager 2 is heading southwards compared to Earth’s orbital plane, only a dish south of the equator can send the probe a sufficiently powerful signal.
NASA started a refresh of the dish’s electrical cabling, power supply and cooling systems in March. The maintenance also saw the installation of a new X-band frequency cone that improved the facility’s sensitivity. Doing so required a crane capable of hoisting the three-tonne cone to a height of 20 storeys. Here’s a vid of that effort.
BIG DAY for the BIG DISH [1]#DSS43
Installation of the new X-band cone in the centre of the antenna dish - Deep Space Station 43🏗️🧂📡 [2]pic.twitter.com/nFg8zf58tJ — CanberraDSN (@CanberraDSN) [3]May 7, 2020
The cone was installed in early May. And NASA has now [4]reveaked that on October 29th the new rig was used to send a command to Voyager 2, and the probe responded.
Which is no mean feat given that Voyager 2 is more than 18,750,000,000 km from Earth and getting further away at a rate of about 60,000 km/h.
The job of upgrading DSS43 is not over, but the success of the Voyager 2 chat has left astroboffins confident they’ll wrap things up in line with the planned February 2021 deadline.
Which will be just in time for the arrival of the Perseverance Rover on Mars, another mission DSS43 will handle along with its normal duties of staying in touch with other space probes. ®
Get our [5]Tech Resources
[1] https://twitter.com/hashtag/DSS43?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
[2] https://t.co/nFg8zf58tJ
[3] https://twitter.com/CanberraDSN/status/1258216399534608384?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
[4] https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/nasa-contacts-voyager-2-using-upgraded-deep-space-network-dish
[5] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
The long break in conversation was due to maintenance of the only Earthly antenna now capable of sending signals to the probe needed an overhaul.
The antenna in question is named Deep Space Station 43 (DSS43) and is located just outside Canberra, Australia’s capital city. The facility’s 70 metre main dish is forty-eight years old and the only antenna of that size in the southern hemisphere. As Voyager 2 is heading southwards compared to Earth’s orbital plane, only a dish south of the equator can send the probe a sufficiently powerful signal.
NASA started a refresh of the dish’s electrical cabling, power supply and cooling systems in March. The maintenance also saw the installation of a new X-band frequency cone that improved the facility’s sensitivity. Doing so required a crane capable of hoisting the three-tonne cone to a height of 20 storeys. Here’s a vid of that effort.
BIG DAY for the BIG DISH [1]#DSS43
Installation of the new X-band cone in the centre of the antenna dish - Deep Space Station 43🏗️🧂📡 [2]pic.twitter.com/nFg8zf58tJ — CanberraDSN (@CanberraDSN) [3]May 7, 2020
The cone was installed in early May. And NASA has now [4]reveaked that on October 29th the new rig was used to send a command to Voyager 2, and the probe responded.
Which is no mean feat given that Voyager 2 is more than 18,750,000,000 km from Earth and getting further away at a rate of about 60,000 km/h.
The job of upgrading DSS43 is not over, but the success of the Voyager 2 chat has left astroboffins confident they’ll wrap things up in line with the planned February 2021 deadline.
Which will be just in time for the arrival of the Perseverance Rover on Mars, another mission DSS43 will handle along with its normal duties of staying in touch with other space probes. ®
Get our [5]Tech Resources
[1] https://twitter.com/hashtag/DSS43?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
[2] https://t.co/nFg8zf58tJ
[3] https://twitter.com/CanberraDSN/status/1258216399534608384?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
[4] https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/nasa-contacts-voyager-2-using-upgraded-deep-space-network-dish
[5] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/