# Voyager Spacecraft Now Leaving Solar System **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 11, 2011, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068 "2011-06-11T03:26:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![scruffycat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scruffycat/32/200_2.png) [@scruffycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scruffycat)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2011, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/21 "2011-06-12T17:16:58Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > If so, we’ll be long gone before anyone sees it. Like I said, one sixth of one percent of a light year. It;s like we’re crowing because it left our living room and has reached the front porch. I don’t know, I think it’s worth crowing about a bit maybe, I mean it’s possible that we are the only species ever in the whole universe to have done such a thing. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2011, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/22 "2011-06-12T19:35:37Z")
> [@spark240](#): > > Does anyone serious think there’s any possibility that there are undiscovered planets (by present definition) orbiting Sol? Well, considering we’re barely able to see Pluto sized bodies like Eris, there is still a possibility there are planet sized bodies lurking in the dark out there in more distant orbits. ---
**Author:** ![Alka\_Seltzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c89c15/32.png) [@Alka\_Seltzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alka_Seltzer)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2011, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/23 "2011-06-12T21:57:19Z")
> [@scruffycat](#): > > I don’t know, I think it’s worth crowing about a bit maybe, I mean it’s possible that we are the only species ever in the whole universe to have done such a thing. It’s worth crowing about, but it’s also worth putting into perspective. The family portrait picture may not be the most photogenic, but it does tell a story about our solar system. it is basically a whole lot of nothing with a few specks of matter in it. And _that_ is nothing compared to the distances between stars. I do wonder what will happen first. Will the Voyagers reach another star system, or will they erode due to collisions with interstellar gases and hits from cosmic rays? ---
**Author:** ![CoffinMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b9bd4f/32.png) [@CoffinMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CoffinMan)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2011, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/24 "2011-06-12T22:06:13Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > Story [here](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-13715764). > > They’re on the edge now. Launched 34 years ago, it now takes 16 hours for a command to reach them. Data being sent back to us show “the edge of our Solar System is a froth of activity, like ‘an agitated jacuzzi’.” > > Farewell. See you when you return in that Star Trek movie. Dude, if our civilization disappears someday - and history tells us it is likely it will - Voyager with it’s gold record of 1970’s era earth sounds and collection of 70’s images of our planet, people and animals will be the only existing legacy of our once flourishing civilization. Millions of years from now, there will still be that thing in space - and the plaque on the moon signed by Richard M. Nixon. ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2011, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/25 "2011-06-12T23:13:47Z")
> [@Alka\_Seltzer](#): > > I do wonder what will happen first. Will the Voyagers reach another star system, or will they erode due to collisions with interstellar gases and hits from cosmic rays? Depends. How much erosion will happen in the 40,000 years it takes to get to the nearest star system? ---
**Author:** ![Alka\_Seltzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c89c15/32.png) [@Alka\_Seltzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alka_Seltzer)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2011, 9:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/26 "2011-06-13T09:59:58Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > Depends. How much erosion will happen in the 40,000 years it takes to get to the nearest star system? Neither of the Voyagers are headed towards a particular star, so it will be a lot longer than that before they have any kind of close encounter with a star system. We are probably talking about hundreds of millions of years. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2011, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/27 "2011-06-13T14:36:48Z")
> [@CoffinMan](#): > > Dude, if our civilization disappears someday - and history tells us it is likely it will - Voyager with it’s gold record of 1970’s era earth sounds and collection of 70’s images of our planet, people and animals will be the only existing legacy of our once flourishing civilization. And will lead to our first contact with an extra-terrestrial intelligence; when we receive the message…“Send more Chuck Berry.” ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2011, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/28 "2011-06-13T14:52:02Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > If so, we’ll be long gone before anyone sees it. Like I said, one sixth of one percent of a light year. It;s like we’re crowing because it left our living room and has reached the front porch. What if sending out something that makes it to the front porch is the minimal criteria the galactic community looks for? ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2011, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/29 "2011-06-14T03:14:13Z")
> [@levdrakon](#): > > What if sending out something that makes it to the front porch is the minimal criteria the galactic community looks for? It’s the signal that lets them know it’s time to come destroy us before we grow too dangerous, heh. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2011, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/30 "2011-06-14T14:44:21Z")
I think that the people who get thye Voyager’s messsage disc will be shocked (they dress like mid-Victorians). “Reginald, the earthy people are like us…except they do not wear any clothing!”:eek: ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2011, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/31 "2011-06-14T14:49:48Z")
Let’s turn this around…what if some other civilization outside our solar system sent a similar probe our way, and it is just now arriving at the edge. How soon would we detect it, and how would we be able to grab it without damage, before it smashed into something, and bring it to Earth for analysis? You can’t just hang a big net out between Mars and Jupiter. ---
**Author:** ![Alka\_Seltzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c89c15/32.png) [@Alka\_Seltzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alka_Seltzer)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2011, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/32 "2011-06-14T15:22:03Z")
If it was similar to voyager, we’d have almost no chance of detecting it. The [RTG](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoelectric_generator)s in voyager only provide power for a few decades, not the minimum of tens of thousands years required to travel between star systems, so it wouldn’t be broadcasting anything. You can’t simply turn them off to save power, as they are powered by radioactive decay, which will happen regardless. The Plutonium used has a half-life of 88 years. In a few years time, automated sky surveys such as PAN-STARRS might be capable of detecting a voyager-sized object and flagging it as having an extra-solar origin (by calculation of it’s orbit), but only if it passed very close to Earth. By that time, there would be absolutely no chance of launching anything to catch up with it. Basically, if you ran several million voyagers through the inner solar system at random there is little chance we would detect any of them, and even if we did it would assumed to be a rock of extra-solar origin rather than a space probe. Aliens are going to have to buy their Chuck Berry on iTunes, just like everybody else. ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2011, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/33 "2011-06-14T15:34:26Z")
> [@Alka\_Seltzer](#): > > Aliens are going to have to buy their Chuck Berry on iTunes, just like everybody else. Darn, that Inter-Galactic Internet download is so _slow._ And the latency is a real bitch. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2011, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068/34 "2011-06-14T16:19:44Z")
Well, Voyager 1 & 2 weren’t really designed to be found, and once their power source runs out in around 10 years, they’re space debris. So, similar probes passing through our system wouldn’t be designed to do anything while here either. OTOH, if we ever do build a probe powerful and long-lived enough to purposely enter another solar system and send back data, it’ll probably be more than powerful enough to make its presence known to any locals who possess our current level of technology. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/voyager-spacecraft-now-leaving-solar-system/585068.md?page=1)